


The Blue of Desire

by fyredancer



Series: Desire [1]
Category: Tokio Hotel
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe - Not Related, Drama, Humor, M/M, Romance, twincest not related
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-11
Updated: 2013-02-11
Packaged: 2017-11-28 23:59:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 17
Words: 76,295
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/680354
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fyredancer/pseuds/fyredancer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bill Trumper's best friend Tom Kaulitz is the envy of all straight men, getting it with countless pretty girls whenever he wants with no strings attached. Bad news for Bill, who knows the best course is to keep his crush hidden to preserve their friendship. One day Tom blows Bill's solidly-rooted notions out of the water with a confession that leaves him more confused than anything. Before Bill realizes, he's tangled up in a dangerous love game with his best friend where only one thing is certain...someone's getting hurt.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Banner by Tomgasm (THF name; I don't know her LJ username), and thanks to Kat for doing beta work for the first half of the fic. (Miss you, gal; still wonder where you went and hope you're doin' okay!) This story is based off a manga that I read and enjoyed several year ago.

"I wonder why looking at your face turns me on."

Bill Trumper sputtered, making a grab for his sandwich as it slipped out of his suddenly slack fingers. He retrieved it before it hit the dirty pavement, but it was a close thing. He brushed at it anyhow, focusing on that small task rather than look up and meet the eyes of the young man who had so casually hit him up with that shocking pronouncement.

It was a beautiful day on campus, and Bill and his friend Tom Kaulitz were enjoying the nice weather for as long as they could between classes. The campus Quad stretched out in front of them like a brilliant emerald flag, criss-crossed with concrete strips that bore up the foot traffic of college students moving to or from their classes. Bill and Tom were seated at the corner table that Bill thought of as "theirs" on the patio outside the student union building. It was, in short, a typical week-day and they'd been doing the usual, chatting about schoolwork and plans and whatever sprang to mind until Tom had dropped that conversational bomb on him.

"Bill?" Tom prompted, sounding as though he was waiting for an answer.

An answer. Bill's stomach bottomed out as he remembered the question. '...looking at your face turns me on.' _Hell_ if that was a question; it was a statement, and one he hardly thought he was qualified to answer.

"Well, how am I supposed to know?" Bill burst out, aware that his voice was a little too loud as it carried across the patio. He hunched his shoulders and looked down at his sandwich as though it, rather than Tom, had betrayed him.

Tom was all too notorious in campus circles as "One-Night Knockout Kaulitz." He'd give a girl the time of her life for one night, but he didn't call them a second time. He wasn't a jerk about it or anything; as he'd told Bill and their friend Andreas, he didn't have the time to nurture a steady relationship with a girl when he had to devote all his spare time to track, schoolwork, and hanging out with Bill and Andreas. He took them out on a couple of dates, got to home base, and then told them they were nice girls; too nice for him - or something. Bill wasn't sure of the details. Tom was discreet enough about his encounters with girls that Bill barely knew he had them, but for the evidence of female testimonials he'd overheard.

The point was, Tom was straight. He was more than straight. He was the envy of straight men; he was getting it whenever he wanted it with pretty girls and no strings attached. There had been enough girls over the past year and a half of their friendship that Bill considered it to be a preponderance of evidence for any jury deciding Tom's orientation.

That was how Bill knew his persistent crush was a forlorn, hopeless fantasy.

"Whoa, calm down," Tom said, infuriatingly calm himself. He crooked his familiar half-smile in Bill's direction and despite himself, Bill felt his agitation fading away.

It was replaced instead by that stupid tug in his middle, the one that gripped Bill sometimes when Tom was doing something sweet or thoughtful. The restless fluttering ache that had taken hold of him pretty much since the first time Tom had grinned at him, when Andreas had introduced Bill to his new roommate. Unfortunately Bill's rebellious middle refused to recognize Tom's demonstrated heterosexuality, and so Bill was still crushing on Tom, and Tom was, of course, still straight.

Now this. Bill replayed the statement in his mind, searching for any hint of ambiguity. 'I wonder why looking at your face...' There wasn't any hidden meaning there. '...turns me on.' He flushed.

"Are you messing with me?" Bill demanded, setting his sandwich onto the lunch tray and fiddling with one of his heavy silver rings. Tom knew that he was bi, and he and Andreas also knew that Bill was that rarest of creatures - a college sophomore virgin. He'd explained very sincerely to his friends that he was waiting for The One, emphasis on the capitals, and he'd been on a string of unsuccessful or flat-out disastrous dates toward that end.

It wasn't Bill's fault that his stubborn insides refused to be turned on by anyone as much as he wanted Tom.

Still, he thought he'd rather successfully disguised his hopeless attraction toward his best friend. For Tom to suddenly say something like this...had he figured it out? Bill's stomach twisted painfully. No, that would just be cruel. Tom wouldn't tease him like that.

"What?" Tom exclaimed, eyes widening. "No, why would I...I'm not messing with you, Bill. Geez." He leaned back on his side of the table and dipped a fry in ketchup, smothering it, his earnest brown eyes still fixed on Bill.

"Well, you and Andreas tease me often enough about looking like a girl," Bill groused, pulling one of his rings off and flipping it over between his fingers before sliding it back on. He glanced at Tom, who was still looking at him, then he had to look down the Quad before a rising flush spread further than faint heat along his cheekbones. "So if it's a joke, it's not funny."

"I'm not joking," Tom said, low.

Something in his voice made Bill glance back sharply to his friend. That was a tone he'd never heard from Tom, something dark and confident, and something low in Bill's belly twitched response. Tom was still looking at him and now he was toying with his lip ring, an absentminded flick-flick of his tongue that drew attention to his sensual mouth and made Bill's imagination run riot thinking what that tongue could do when applied to other places.

Bill's mouth was suddenly dry. "What do you want me to say?" he murmured, picking up his sandwich, but not to eat. His appetite had dried up along with his sense of humor. He was sure all of a sudden that this was part of some elaborate joke, and he was the butt of it.

"What do you think?" Tom asked, leaning forward and placing his broad, fine-boned hands on the table, lacing them together. His eyes were on Bill and they were so serious, unwavering.

Bill had to look away and bite his lip. His chest felt tight. Tom didn't know, he couldn't know. He'd said he wasn't kidding but now it seemed like a sick joke, not even the good-natured teasing he'd gotten from Andreas and even Tom before now, and it made him want to scream. "I think you need to get laid," he said at last, keeping his tone light, teasing. He waved a beringed hand at himself. "Getting turned on over this face? Come on! You know I'm not a girl, so you'd better not start treating me like one."

Tom let out a noise as though he'd been holding his breath. He made a long arm across the table, reaching for Bill's abandoned sandwich. "Maybe you're right. You gonna finish that?"

"Get away, that's mine!" Bill squealed, slapping at his friend's hand and ignoring the little thrill of contact that prickled through him as their skin touched. He should be used to it by now, given the way Tom acted as though personal space was a concept that applied to other people but not him. The charge of skin contact didn't get any less with proximity, though, so Bill did his best to cope.

"You're not going to eat it," Tom argued. "Don't be so stingy."

"I'll wrap it up and finish it later. You haven't even finished your fries yet!"

"They're cold," Tom complained. "You know I don't like to finish cold food when it's supposed to be hot."

"Oh, so now you're making it my problem that you didn't stuff your face fast enough..." Bill began, relieved that they were falling back into the pattern of their normal banter, uncomfortable anomaly past.

"Hey! Am I too late for the food fight?" a familiar voice called, and Andreas Levin dumped his backpack onto the seat beside Bill, tousling Bill's hair before plopping himself down.

"No, you're just in time," Tom said smoothly, but Bill thought he looked annoyed.

"Oh, good," Andreas said, grabbing at the disputed sandwich. Before Bill could do much more than widen horrified eyes, Andreas immediately crammed in half the remainder and spoke through indistinct bites, "You weren't going to finish this, were you?"

Bill dropped his head into his hands. "Doesn't matter now," he muttered, resigned.

"C'mon," Andreas said, patting his shoulder. "We've got to get to class."

"Right," Bill replied, getting to his feet and grabbing his backpack and handbag. This, at least, was back to normal. He and Tom both had an eleven o'clock on campus in the same building; they had lunch at the union together; Andreas met them after for the comparative literature class the three of them shared at one. "Tom?"

Tom was still in his seat, hands steepled before him, his gaze gone halfway across the patio.

Bill tracked the path of Tom's gaze and rolled his eyes. Tom had made eye contact with a pretty, petite brunette several tables over. She was quirking her fingers at him in a cute little wave.

"Oho, watch out, Ariel's on the prowl!" Andreas crowed, catching sight of where Tom's attention had gone.

"Okay, well, we'd better get to class," Bill said, brushing his dark hair over one shoulder before sliding his backpack on.

Ariel was getting up and heading in their direction, her eyes fixed purposefully on Tom.

"Hey, I'll catch up with you guys," Tom said, standing and grabbing Bill's tray, stacking it under his own.

"As usual," Andreas said with a laugh, turning to Bill and tugging at his shirt.

"Yeah, whatever," Bill said, trying to brush it off as the usual. Tom's strange confession was still on his mind, and all of a sudden he couldn't get away fast enough. "Let's go, Andi." He left the patio area without looking back at Tom or waiting for Andreas. He knew at least one of his friends would catch up with him.

"Hey," Andreas said after a moment, making long strides and falling into step with him.

Bill grimaced something resembling a smile at his friend.

"You look kind of funny," Andreas observed, peering at him as they walked side by side toward one of the old-fashioned brick buildings on the far end of the Quad.

"Hmm." Bill made a distracted noise, pulling a small compact from his bag to check his teeth for stray spinach or something as they walked. While he was at it, he reapplied his new favorite gloss, a shiny nude shade that tasted faintly of berries.

"Did Tom say something weird to you?" Andreas prodded, now reaching out and grasping Bill's shoulder, halting their forward momentum. "Seriously, Bill, I don't think I've seen you look this uncomfortable since you came back from a bad date."

Bill could feel himself starting to turn red. "It's nothing," he began.

"Did Tom tell you that he..." Andreas made a hand motion that could have been anything, from stabbing someone in the stomach to something a lot naughtier.

Bill came to a dead stop, heat slamming into his face in a nauseating wave. "Oh, God, he didn't say anything to you, did he?" he said between clenched teeth. "Andi..."

"What? He's my roommate as well as my friend; we talk about stuff," Andreas said, cheerfully oblivious to Bill's discomfort.

"Ugh," Bill said. He crossed his arms over his front and glared at the sidewalk.

"Sorry, I told him not to tell you," Andreas said. "It's a bit much, don't you think? I mean, what are you supposed to say to something like that..."

Bill bit his lip and thought about looking over his shoulder, or grabbing his phone to text Tom even though he knew it was pointless. Regardless of whether Bill needed to be rescued from this embarrassing conversation, Tom was on the prowl and if he was going to be late to class, he'd be late. Not only that, but Bill had been the one to tell him he needed to get laid. That was it; Tom would get laid, and things would get back to normal.

Andreas continued, "...when your best friend tells you he thinks about your face when he's coming?"

Bill's mouth dropped open. The world swayed into alarming soft focus around him and he was convinced for one hyper-lucid moment that his heart had stopped until he realized the hammering noise in his ears was his pulse. "He _what?_ "

Andreas pulled a face, as though finally realizing he'd said something he shouldn't have. "Oh...he didn't tell you that part?"

"Maybe not all of those words in that exact order," Bill managed.

Andreas widened his eyes. "Whoops. Well, forget I said anything, okay? I'm sure it's a phase, or something." He started walking again, hitching his backpack up higher on his shoulder and checking his watch.

Bill gnashed his teeth. "How am I supposed to think of anything _but?_ " he muttered. With a soft, despairing groan he clutched at his head. Now he was picturing Tom's come-face.

He wanted to die. Or punch Tom next time he saw him. Neither option would particularly help him out of his dilemma, but either one might make him feel better.


	2. Chapter 2

Bill had his face buried in a textbook long enough to cool his fair skin by the time Tom joined them in one of the back rows of the lecture hall. The professor was droning on about something to do with patriarchal attitudes and their implications in the text that had been assigned. Though late, Tom was grinning as he slipped into his seat beside Andreas.

"Late," Andreas hissed, poking his pen at Tom.

Tom flipped his dirty-blond dreadlocks back over his shoulder and made a face. He grabbed a notebook out of his bag, leaning over to address Bill. "So what'd I miss?"

Bill shook his head faintly, eyes moving from Tom and his cocky grin back to the professor, who was writing something on his overhead that Bill debated whether to copy or not. It seemed to have only a vague connection to either the lecture or the text. His attention was elsewhere.

"Was it worth it?" Andreas continued, asking the question for which Bill had really wanted an answer, but didn't have the guts to ask.

Tom stuck his tongue out briefly. His eyes locked on Bill's as he did, and Bill couldn't help but look away again, heat sweeping through his cheeks in an embarrassing and very much unwanted reflex. He stuck the end of his pen in his mouth, hoping like hell Tom wouldn't think anything of his red face or if he did, that he'd only think Bill was still irritated at him from earlier.

"I set something up with her for later, if that's what you mean," Tom stage-whispered. "Whatever, it doesn't matter. Bill, you're up for the usual on Friday, right?"

Bill leaned on his notebook and pretended to think. "I dunno, won't you be out on a date?" He pondered his chances of lining something up before then, so that he wouldn't be left hanging with no plans.

It wasn't as though he had a shortage of offers from guys or girls – he didn't. The problem was that Bill wasn't looking for quick hook-ups; he was looking for more than that. He wanted a real connection with someone. The issue with most people he could outright ask, rather than working up to it with flirting and getting to know them first, was that they often didn't look beyond the surface with Bill, and they thought someone with his appearance had to put out.

"Don't be silly," Tom said dismissively. "Friday's pizza and movie night with my best friends."

Bill bit his lip, but he was already smiling. "Fine, yeah, I guess I can put up with your ugly faces on Friday night."

"Hey!" Andreas put in, sounding miffed. "He's the ugly one."

Tom grinned over at Bill. "Are you kidding? My good looks are one of the biggest draws, and you know it."

Bill wrinkled his nose and turned his attention back to the notes he was supposed to be taking. "You wish."

Really, it was more like Bill's wish that there wasn't more than a hint of truth to Tom's teasing statement. Also, it would be nice for him if Tom's jokes weren't more than a little bit on the flirty side, but that was just the way they were. Bill had long since figured it was part Tom's easygoing, sex-oriented personality; and part Tom's way of letting him know he was cool with Bill being so pretty, and open about his bisexuality.

The rest of the lecture passed in a daze for Bill. He doodled in the margin of his notebook and made a series of increasingly incoherent geometric shapes after giving up on paying attention to the professor's lecture on the assigned reading. He thought the man was reading too much into a relatively simple text and he was already planning on saying as much if he ended up having to write an essay on it. Bill excelled at elevating polite disagreement to a point where even if his professors disagreed with him, they couldn't help but admire the structure of his arguments and give him a decent grade anyhow.

At last the old-fashioned bell in the eaves of the auditorium sent up a clamor and Bill jerked, knocking his notebook and pen over. He cussed and bid goodbye to Andreas, who had to run off to work, and bent to retrieve his things.

"Shit!" Bill yelled, when he straightened and grabbed his backpack in one quick motion and brought himself into imminent danger of facial collision with Tom. "Jesus, Tom! What are you doing, hovering like that? I could have clocked you and taken you out!"

Tom caught him by the shoulders; steadied him with a laugh. "Are you kidding? I don't think you've got the body mass."

"But I do have a hard skull," Bill argued.

"True enough," Tom said. He wasn't moving away, and Bill couldn't edge past him to get out of the row. "You okay?"

"No, it's just...boring lecture," Bill said vaguely, waving his hand.

"Yeah, it was," Tom agreed. "Were you thinking about...stuff?" He winked.

"I guess," Bill said, throwing Tom a puzzled look. He tapped his foot. "You just going to keep standing there, or...?"

"Oh, sorry," Tom apologized at once, and he backed up a step before turning around to exit the row of seats.

Bill stared at his friend's back for a moment before shoving his things into his backpack. He paid more attention to the arrangement of notebooks than was strictly necessary, considering he was done with his lecture classes for the day. It was easier to wait until the crush of people blocking the aisle and doors had ebbed somewhat, and it gave him a little time to contemplate Tom's sudden onset of crazy. He was used to people telling him he was attractive, even kind of ambushing him with it and acting more than a little stupid about it. He was used to Tom flirting with him, in a cute sort of teasing way. 

He was definitely _not_ used to a sudden convergence of the two. Bill was off-balance, and it was Tom, and he didn't know how to react.

"Hey," Tom said, touching his elbow.

"What?" Bill snapped, jerking away and hauling his backpack over his shoulder. He'd gotten so diverted on that train of thought, Tom had essentially snuck up on him again.

"You're not pissed at me, are you?" Tom asked, his tone strangely gentle.

Bill cast him a puzzled look. "Pissed at you? No, why would I be?"

"Well, from what I said earlier," Tom began. One hand went up into the fall of his shaggy dreadlocks and he cast a sidelong glance at Bill. It wasn't his usual smirk; it was something else, as though he were either trying to tell Bill something with that look, or coax him into something.

"Stop," Bill said, raising a hand. "Let's get off that subject, all right? I'm not mad at you, so...drop it."

"Okay, okay," Tom said, holding his hands up defensively. "Consider it dropped." He frowned.

"All right." Bill breathed a sigh of relief and offered Tom a little smile. The sooner he could stop thinking about that weird unsolicited disclosure, the better.

They bumped shoulders on their way out of the auditorium doors and Bill caught his breath. Had Tom always walked this close to him when they went places together? He hated that he was questioning it now, that he was picking apart the aspects of their friendship.

Damn it, it was _Tom's_ fault, and he, Bill, wasn't going to let things get weird.

"You want to come over later and hang out?" Tom offered, as they stepped into the warm golden light of late afternoon.

Bill squinted against the harsh angle of the sun and pulled his Dior Homme sunglasses out of his bag, sighing with relief at the instant lessening of the glare. He'd saved up about a year's worth of parental stipend to afford them, but they looked so good on him it had been worth it. "Wait, what?"

Tom's hand rubbed at the base of his neck. "Come over, later."

"Don't you have track?" Bill said, squinting at Tom now. His friend had track almost every day, including weekends.

"No, it's cancelled today," Tom replied. "I ran this morning before my first class to make up for it."

"Oh," Bill said, trying to swallow around the sudden unasked-for resurgence of flutterbys in his middle. "Well, I've got homework."

"Really?" Tom said with a frown. He reached up to tug on one of his dreadlocks, the frayed one he played with when he was nervous.

"Yeah, sorry," Bill said with a smile. He was a little relieved. Tom still wanted to hang out; they were already back to normal.

"Come over anyhow," Tom urged.

Bill arched a brow at him. "Come on, Tom, you know if I come over, we're not going to do homework." Tom's ears were beginning to turn red as Bill continued triumphantly, "I'd kick your ass at Rock Band 2." Bill eyed the color creeping up Tom's neck with fascination.

"Oh," Tom said with a cough. "Right. Well, yeah. We probably...we would, I know. Sorry."

"If I didn't have so much to do," Bill said, now frustrated. He made a little face. There was pretty much nothing he enjoyed better than hanging out with Tom. No, not even dates. It sucked that his favorite person was the one who was off-limits, and he certainly couldn't find anyone to date who measured up to the absurd Tom-shaped standard his intractable emotions had set for him.

"Yeah," Tom said, and squared his shoulders. "I know how it is. And we're hanging out Friday, for sure."

"We'd better be, or I'll have cancelled my plans for nothing," Bill said solemnly.

Tom widened his eyes. "You made plans for our Friday?" he demanded.

Bill laughed and smacked him. "Don't be an idiot," he said, dredging up what Tom had said earlier and tossing it back at him with a smug look. "It's movie and pizza night with my best friends, right?"

"Right," Tom said with a grin. He licked his lips, his eyes still on Bill.

"I'd, uh..." Bill reached up and adjusted his sunglasses. "I've got to get to musical composition. I'll see you later." He gave Tom a reserved smile, remembering the way that brunette, Ariel, had gotten up after that eager little wave for Tom and how he'd surely gotten her number.

The way Tom moved, and what with his reputation, things would probably get physical with Ariel _fast._

"Try not to have too much fun," Tom said, giving him a flippant little salute and reaching up to grasp his backpack strap as he turned to walk up the quad. "Text you later!"

Bill pressed a hand to one cheekbone, self-conscious again. It was a good thing that Tom would be getting with Ariel, he told himself. Then he'd forget his stupid thoughts about Bill and his face. Tom had said he got turned on; Andreas had said Tom thought about Bill's face when he came. He had every right to be mad at Tom for bringing up that sort of thing, but he wasn't.

Instead, he felt hot and a little sick; unsure if it was excitement or disgust. He knew one thing for sure: it wasn't going to lead anywhere. Like the unrealistic crush he'd been harboring for the past year and three months, he had to bury it.

His music comp class was in a quaint older building on the edge of campus. It was Bill's last class of the day on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and he was glad he'd arranged it that way. Music was always a brilliant way to end the day, even when it frustrated him. The class made him stretch his abilities; it tested his patience; it got him riled up and conversely, soothed him occasionally. Sometimes it seemed as though music was the only steady constant in his life. It rode him hard and some days he hated it as much as he loved it, but he had to do it.

It was his music; it was his pulse and his best and brightest way of interacting with the world.

"Hey, Bill!' 

Not two steps through the door, Georg Listing was waving him over. The upperclassman was seated by one of the window seats as usual and he was giving Bill his usual half-cocky, half goofy grin. Georg was a senior majoring in musical theory and he played a wicked bass line at live clubs on weekends. For some reason he hadn't gotten around to taking the class Bill was currently enrolled in until his senior year, and it was to Bill's gain so far as he was concerned. Georg was a nice guy with a sly sense of humor, and he'd proved to be an excellent sounding board for bouncing off half-formed lyrics and melodies.

"Hey," Bill greeted him, stowing his glasses and joining him at the far side of the class.

Georg put on a concerned face. "What's up?" he inquired, leaning over as Bill seated himself.

Bill grimaced and made a little pushing gesture with his hand as the teacher took her place at the front of the class. The occasionally annoying thing about Georg was his observational skill. Either that or Bill really was that transparent. Bill consoled himself that that couldn't be true because if so, Tom would have figured out his crush ages ago.

Then again, it could simply be that Tom really was that dense.

"This afternoon we're going to do a pairs exercise, to apply the technique that we learned in Monday's class and hopefully retained through practice over the past couple of nights," the teacher informed them. 

Groans and unenthusiastic grunts rippled around the room at her announcement, and Bill turned expectantly to Georg.

"Yes, Bill, I'd love to be your partner; thank you for asking," Georg responded to his wide-eyed look with a teasing grin.

"Oh, Georg!" Bill patted his hands together in several quick little claps. "It's like you read my mind."

Georg scooted his chair closer. "You are going to tell me what's wrong, though, right?"

Bill pursed his lips. "I'll think about it. Let's work on our exercise first, okay?"

"Right."

There was an easel with fresh, blank musical score sheeting across from each of them, but Bill dragged his chair right up close to Georg's so that they could share his.

"It's such a dry exercise," Georg noted. "They should let us bring instruments for this class; it would liven things up for us."

"That's too bad for you," Bill said airily.

"Yeah, yeah, your voice is portable; you've always got your instrument on hand."

Bill nodded, fiddled with a black marker, and dropped it three times as Georg looked at the blank sheet with a thoughtful expression.

At length, Bill spoke up and ventured in a small voice, "Georg...?" He made sure that, unlike normal for him, his question wouldn't carry through the vaulted reaches of the top-floor music room.

Georg looked up, quirking his left brow. "Yeah, Bill?"

"Is it...normal...for straight guys to suddenly express an interest in a guy?"

Georg's eyes widened, and a chuckle began to escape him before he raised his hand, coughing instead. "Bill..."

"Seriously!" Bill insisted, irritated all at once over the notion Georg might patronize him.

"Well, it wouldn't be the first time for you, would it?" Georg asked him, waggling his eyebrows. "I mean, you've already told me about several propositions you've received only this semester. Seems like every other class you've been chased in here on the heels of someone hitting on you."

"True," Bill said, looking down and biting his lip. "But I mean...this is someone who is, like, the epitome of straight. And let's say it's someone that...a guy has known for a while. And all of a sudden this straight man is saying this guy's face turns him on."

He waited expectantly as Georg looked out the window, not flushing but definitely appearing somewhat put on the spot.

"Well, it happens sometimes, you know?" Georg said at last, turning back to Bill and giving an uncomfortable, wry laugh. "Especially with guys in sports, or so I hear. Giving each other handjobs, or whatever, when they're not getting any."

"This straight guy gets plenty," Bill said with certainty.

Georg's mouth tugged up in a sort of half-smirk. "Well, college is for experimenting, as they say. Probably it's just curiosity, you know?"

"Right. College is for experimenting," Bill echoed mechanically. It was his turn to look out the window.

So in a way, Tom was messing with Bill, even if he didn't realize. Tom was curious; Bill was pretty. He supposed it was only natural.

"Thanks, Georg," Bill said absent-mindedly at last, flashing the upperclassman a strained smile.

Georg gave him a dubious look in return. "Didn't seem to help any," he commented.

"No, it's fine," Bill insisted. It was a relief, if he thought about it that way. Something experimental, nothing to do with Bill at all, really. He was a stand-in, a cardboard cutout. It could be any pretty boy's face that Tom was imagining, but Bill happened to be close to hand.

Bill was satisfied that his hopeless crush was still safely secret.


	3. Chapter 3

The rest of the week passed by so fast that Friday was slapping Bill upside the head before he knew it. The days that passed had been normal; stultifying but reassuringly normal. He woke up, he went to classes, he crushed on Tom, he did his homework, he scribbled down lyrics when they bit him in the ass and wouldn't let go. Neither Tom nor Andreas had brought up the revelation of the other day and Bill wasn't about to do it for them.

"It's pathetic how much I've been looking forward to today," Bill told Georg in passing, as they both packed up their stuff to leave the music composition classroom.

"Why?" Georg said, throwing him a puzzled look. "It's Friday. It's the best day of the week, man."

Bill wrinkled his nose immediately. "No way; that's Saturday. When you have a full day off, but you don't have to worry about the weekend ending, like on Sunday."

"Unless you have work, like some of us," Georg said wryly, settling his backpack on his shoulder.

"Oh," Bill said, grimacing an apology at Georg. "Yeah, I mooch off my parents; they want me to stay focused on my studies – I only work during summers." He banked enough to keep him stocked in gummies, household expenses, and skinny jeans.

"Nice for you," Georg commented. "Anyhow, have a good one!"

"You too," Bill said, waving. He was relieved Georg had let him off without pressing Bill for his reasons on being so hyped for today. It was enough that most people were excited for Friday on general principle; it meant drinks and shots and table-dancing and freshman binge-drinkers puking at the curb. Bill wrinkled his nose; he was glad he and his friends usually stayed in on Fridays. It was dollar shot night at most of the clubs in town, and that spelled trouble for anyone who wanted to get through the night with clean shoes.

Bill took the Blue Line to Tom and Andreas's apartment. They didn't live too far from campus – close enough that Tom tended to jog or walk in, Bill knew, if time allowed in the morning – but Bill usually wore sweet boots with bitchin' heels that were in no way suitable for extended walking. Looking good enough to wear Gucci was enough exercise, Bill told Tom whenever his friend tried to coax him to join him on a run.

"Hey," Tom said, throwing the door wide halfway through Bill's second knock.

"Um," Bill responded, his eyes widening hard enough to hurt himself. He couldn't look away, but he was afraid of doing himself permanent damage. Tom had a towel wrapped around his dreads, his chest was bare and flecked with water droplets, and he was wearing a pair of track pants over boxers that had a print pattern of sunflowers on a green field – Bill was fascinated by the top edge of the boxers that was visible above Tom's pants. It was molded to a set of fantastic abs.

Tom flaunted his body rarely enough that Bill had forgotten the impact it had on him.

"Come in," Tom said, stepping aside to give him room to pass, cocking his head in silent invitation. He licked his bottom lip and regarded Bill expectantly.

"Uh, right," Bill said, sailing through the door and lifting a hand to his mouth to do a quick drool check. Dry; he hadn't lost his senses yet. "Go put some clothes on."

"Give me a break; I just showered," Tom protested. "Besides, you like it."

Bill dumped his stuff beside the couch and whirled, a snappy retort on his lips. It was snatched out of his mouth when he turned and was confronted with the nearness of half-naked Tom, who had crept up on him on silent bare feet after shutting the door. The towel was around Tom's neck now, and the dreads were loose down his back, set free to tumble around his face.

"Wh-what," Bill huffed instead. If Tom kept standing there looking at him like that, he was going to steal the towel and crack him a good one on those tanned, tight abs. He had to drag his eyes back up to Tom's face, and cursed himself out when he met Tom's knowing smirk.

"Been thinking about it, then?" Tom asked him.

"What?" Bill said blankly, caught staring.

Tom gave him a little smile, one that barely touched the corners of his lips but his brown eyes were sparkling. "You know, 'it.'"

"'It?" Bill repeated mindlessly. "What do you mean, 'it?'"

Tom tilted his head to the side. "What I said the other day; you know, about your face..."

The air was buzzing; it was thick with a sudden swarm of bees by the sound of it and Bill had to clap his hands to his ears. "No, God, shut up, Tom," Bill whined. "Why would I think about that? You're so full of it. You're...you're my best friend." He flushed and turned away.

It was a lie; Bill hadn't been able to get his mind off anything but Tom's stupid non-sequitur for days. He kept trying not to picture it, and it had been taking Bill twice as long to do his homework. His landlord's water bill was going to be twice as high, too.

Bill wondered if cold water was cheaper than hot; if so, perhaps there was a savings.

"Don't you have a girl right now, anyhow?" he called out, moving away from Tom in favor of grabbing a drink from the kitchen. His friends had an open-fridge policy so long as Bill paid for his share of the pizza and tipped the delivery person.

"That's got nothing to do with it," Tom said, right behind him from the sound of it – and therefore still maddeningly close.

"What?" Bill turned, Coke in hand, and frowned at Tom's bare chest. "Go put a shirt on and stop flaunting it, Kaulitz." He raised a brow, dragged his eyes up to Tom's face again, and gave him a faintly mocking smile – the one he put on for louts at Saturday night parties who thought they could feel him up in the bathroom.

"Fine, fine, be right back," Tom replied, drawing the towel from around his neck and giving one last swipe to his chest. On his way out of the kitchen, he snapped the towel at Bill and snorted with laughter when Bill yelped and nearly dropped his Coke.

"Jerk!" Bill yelled after him, folding one arm over his chest. Tom's hysterical laughter, trailing through the apartment, was the only response.

Bill sighed and raked a hand through his hair. He had determined that the best course was to try and ignore it, but damn if Tom wasn't making it difficult. And he was pretty certain their casual flirting had never gone to _this_ level before.

He shucked his boots off and went to make himself at home on the couch, which was the main fixture of the living room. It was a typical college apartment, shoes and clutter in the corner, not much by way of furniture, and the TV and sound system were elevated on a structure of assembled milk crates held together with duct tape. The "coffee table" was a sheet of plywood set atop a pair of empty, well-rinsed oil drums that had been sawed in half. Andreas was messy but Tom picked up, so the whole effect was that of restrained chaos. Bill plucked a ratty fleece blanket off the couch and tossed it toward Andreas's broken-backed La-Z-Boy that he'd dragged in from Goodwill. In doing so, he uncovered a pile of books, scribbled-upon papers, and a paper towel wrapped around a half-eaten slice of dried-out pizza.

"Ugh, Andreas," Bill said, wrinkling his nose and pinching the abandoned leftovers with thumb and forefinger. He set his Coke down and tossed the dead slice of pizza in the trash, wiped his hand on the couch arm, then excavated himself a seat, unceremoniously piling his friend's homework on the floor beside the couch.

"Hey, so, you hungry?" Tom asked him, sauntering back into the room wearing a tank top. It was a great deal more fitted than most of his double-X large gangster style tees. He had tied his hair up high on the back of his head, but hadn't donned the beanie he usually put over his scalp.

To Bill's mind the tank top wasn't too great of an improvement over half-naked Tom. He could still see neck and collarbones, after all. It was somehow even more sexy to see only a small peek, with the greater expanse of chest covered. Not to mention, Tom's bare arms were lean with smooth muscle, not bulging but just toned enough.

"Hungry," Bill repeated, latching onto that last word as a lifeline. "Yeah, I'm hungry; I'm starved. Where's Andreas?"

Tom's bare shoulders moved up and down in a shrug. "Thought he'd be here by now."

"We should call..." Bill began, and laughed when he was interrupted by the blare of Tom's rap music ring tone from across the room.

Tom quirked a brow at him, said, "The kid's got timing," and jogged over to get it.

"What's up?" Tom said into the phone, putting it on speaker and setting it onto the plywood table as he dropped onto the couch beside Bill. "Bill's here; we're waiting on you, man."

"Shit, you guys, the usual dude who lets me buy is gone. I'm trying to find someone to go in and buy for me, but it could be a while...so far it's been a no-go. I need to find some senior who'll go along with it," Andreas's voice crackled out of the phone's tinny speaker. 

"Have you tried calling David?" Tom prodded, naming an older townie who had obligingly bought beer for them on more than one occasion.

"I tried him first; he's out of town this weekend," Andreas said.

Bill raised his brows. "Do we really need beer?"

"Yes," Tom and Andreas answered simultaneously.

Bill cast his eyes up and let it go. He was fine with just Coke all evening, but his friends liked the beer 'to unwind,' as they put it, though Bill thought the only time any of them were really stressed was around finals. Or right before a big track meet, for Tom. Bill thought of Georg, who was a senior, but realized that despite their friendliness he didn't have Georg's number. Also, he didn't know if Georg would be comfortable buying beer for three underage sophomores.

"I dunno how long this is going to take me, it could be an hour or more," Andreas continued. "But wait to order the pizza, will you?"

"Yeah, right," Tom snorted. "We're hungry. You can re-heat."

"It's not the same! You jerk--"

One brow raised, Tom gave Bill his impish smirk as he deliberately thumbed the little red button to end the call. Bill found himself laughing, even though he did have some sympathy for Andreas.

Not enough to try and coax Tom to delay a pizza order, though.

"Looks like it's just you and me, then," Tom murmured beside him.

Bill turned to meet Tom's gaze. Tom's head was put to the side a bit, and his brown eyes were on Bill, his mouth slanted in an appraising smile. It was the eyes that drew him in, and made him unable to look away. If he did look away, he lost; there was a challenge in those eyes, even as they asked something of Bill that he wasn't quite sure he could answer. The moment hung suspended between them; it loomed heavy with the weight of expectation in Tom's gaze.

Bill licked his own lips nervously. If Tom started playing with that tongue ring of his, he was finished.

"You still owe me an epic battle," Bill informed Tom, leaning in to poke a finger into his friend's chest.

Tom's eyes widened. "Do I," he said, sounding reflective, and the closeness between them became too much as Tom's tongue emerged to flick at his lip ring.

Bill leaped off the couch as though it had been set on fire, stumbling off in search of the wireless guitar rack before remembering that it was in the opposite direction. Tom was already laughing at him.

"God, Bill, you're so clumsy," Tom said affectionately. "Rock Band, huh?"

"Yes," Bill said, grabbing his favorite guitar, the faux-Gibson, and slipping the strap over his head. He held the guitar in front of him like a shield. "And I'm going to beat you this time, you wait and see."

"Yeah, right," Tom jeered. He rose from the couch and messed around with the front of the entertainment system, trading out a game disc then turning to grab his own wireless guitar. "I am gonna beat your ass like a bongo drum."

Bill ducked his head and turned his guitar on, letting hair fall across his face to disguise the sudden sweep of heat that blazed across his face. He'd gotten a brief but vivid image from Tom's words, and the weirdest part was the leap of curious excitement that accompanied the thought.

"Just because you play a real guitar doesn't make you the Rock Band god," Bill said haughtily. He flexed his fingers, limbering them up for extended play.

"You'll see, you'll see," Tom said, nodding and sending dreadlocks coursing over his shoulders as he bent over his guitar.

Bill grinned. "Shut up," he said, hitting the first button on the neck "frets" to speed through the opening screens.

They warmed up on hard mode, and Bill edged out over Tom's score by one percent. "Yes!" he crowed, hopping around like a loon and punching his fists toward the sky. "Yes, yes, yes!" He stabbed a finger in Tom's direction.

"It's cute how you get so excited over a warm up," Tom drawled, "when I'm totally about to whip your ass."

"Talk is cheap," Bill said. "Order the pizza, will you? It's Friday night, everybody who stays in gets pizza for the night. Andreas might manage get back before they're delivered, and we can't have that."

"Oh, right."

Tom turned with a grin once he was done placing the order. "Come on, pick a song. Ready for expert yet?"

"Bring it," Bill challenged with a lift of his chin.

By the next song, Tom tipped the balance by one percent over Bill, and by the third he had a whole five percent margin over Bill. They played until Bill squealed that his wrist was hurting and Tom made his usual joke comparing their several rounds of Rock Band to jerking off about sixty guys.

"Wouldn't you like to know," Bill retorted, turning away from the grin Tom was flashing him to rack his guitar. "No way was that sixty. Maybe thirty, tops."

Tom was quiet for a moment, then said, "Have you? With guys?"

"Ugh," Bill said, and pivoted to give Tom a glare. "You know I haven't. But I _am_ a guy, Tom, and I know how it works on my own equipment."

Tom set his wireless guitar on the floor and fiddled with the headstock. "But, if you were to have sex--"

"Play something for me," Bill interrupted, not sure where Tom was going with that but certain that he didn't want him to finish. They had talked about sex before, of course; usually after a few drinks, especially when Tom and Andreas expressed renewed curiosity on the topic of how Bill knew he was bisexual when he hadn't actually done it with either sex. "It's been a while, you know? I want to hear your acoustic."

Tom looked up at him, the tiniest of frowns settled on his brow. "Bill?"

"Please?" Bill wheedled. He pushed hair out of his face and settled on the couch, bringing his legs up. "You never play when Andi is around, only with me."

Tom ducked his head, a small but obvious grin tugging his mouth upward. "Well, maybe I think he doesn't appreciate it the way you do, my little music major."

Bill laughed. "Or you save it up for whenever Andi's trying to, you know, actually work on homework, so he gets pissed by association whenever you haul out your acoustic."

"Whatever," Tom said, now definitely grinning. "What do I get in return?"

"My undying loyalty," Bill replied, lolling back against the couch pillows.

Tom thrust his lower lip out. "I thought I already had that! Bill..."

"What? Go get your guitar," Bill said, flapping a hand to shoo Tom on.

"Playing guitar is very personal for me," Tom said, fixing him with earnest brown eyes. "So I should get something personal in exchange, don't you think?"

Bill bit his lip, looked down at his knees, then looked up to give Tom a faint smile. "Just go and get it," he said.

Tom gave him a long, appraising look, tugged on one of his dreadlocks, then turned to go.

When Tom left the room, Bill hugged his knees to his chest. If he didn't know better, he'd say Tom was...flirting? But Tom was a flirt with everyone. This was different. He couldn't put his finger on it, exactly. There was a weight to Tom's gaze, a kind of questioning pressure when he looked at Bill, offered him a sweet grin or even frowned his way. "This is stupid," he whispered to his knees. It couldn't go anywhere. He wasn't an idiot; he knew that Tom was probably still projecting his curiosity onto Bill. Tom was his friend, though, and Bill wanted to keep it that way.

Of course, telling himself that was pretty pointless when he looked up as Tom re-entered the room, guitar in hand, and Bill's rebellious middle swirled with a ridiculous exuberance. Tom was shuffling in like a bashful little boy, head ducked, free hand rubbing at the nape of his neck.

"Only because you asked," Tom told him, leveling a serious look on him. He could have perched on Andreas's armchair, but instead settled on the couch cushion beside Bill.

"Come on, you know you love to play for me," Bill said, nudging Tom's bare foot with his stockinged one.

"For you," Tom agreed, bent over his guitar and beginning to strum random chords. "I couldn't find a pick, so I'm not gonna play for too long."

He nodded once to himself, patted the belly of the guitar, then positioned his hand at the frets and began to play. Bill hugged his knees to his chest again and leaned back against the cushions, letting the music wrap around him like a safe haven, the yearning of those first few notes striking an answering chord in his chest. He knew all too well what it was to long for what he couldn't have.

Tom didn't sing, not even in front of Bill, so Bill crooned along softly when the song was past its opening chords and reached the point where the singing part of the melody joined in. Tom played that one all the way through, struck his hand over all of the strings then laid his hand flat over them, silencing the guitar after a startling jolt of sound.

"Finished," Tom announced.

"No, one more," Bill pleaded. "That was sad, don't leave it on a sad note."

Tom slanted a smirk at him. "You're such a sap, Bill," he told him, and began to pluck his way through a more upbeat tune. He began a familiar pop riff, then switched over to a rollicking ballad that Bill had sung many times in choir. It was catchy and Bill wanted to sing along, again, but bit his lip and watched Tom getting into the song, instead.

"You like it," Bill said, parroting back Tom's words from earlier.

Tom tongued his lip and ignored him, pouring his attention and a sudden energy into the quick fingering over the guitar strings. He was really getting into it, and he threw his head back, strumming with vigor.

Bill tipped his head to the side and he was thinking about _that_ again; exactly what he couldn't stop thinking about all week. Tom thought about Bill's face when he came, and now as Bill watched, a bead of sweat slid down his friend's face and all he could do was wonder if it was even a little bit similar to the pleasured look on Tom's face right now. His head was back and angled to one side, mouth open, brows faintly drawn above slitted eyes, and there was such euphoria in his face that Bill had to look away, his belly tense with unsettled sensation.

"Better?" Tom's hand stilled the strings of his guitar again.

"Oh..." Bill looked back, fixing his mouth in a cheerful grin. "Better, definitely, um. Happier."

Tom's eyes were open now, and he was poking his lip bolt with his tongue. He set his guitar aside and shifted closer on the sofa. "Bill..."

 _What do you want?_ Bill almost asked, eyelashes fluttering, and he couldn't look away. The certainty that he was going to be kissed slammed into him like a train wreck and he started to shake his head ever so slightly. It was the weight of expectation again, and it was going to crush him. His eyes flickered, traveling from Tom's so-serious brown eyes to his full, somewhat chapped lips down the column of his strong throat and further down. There was a dark little mole right beneath the wing of Tom's left collarbone, and Bill was possessed of the urge to lean forward and lick it, to see where that took them and how Tom tasted. And suddenly he knew Tom would probably let him. This was such a bad idea.

Not because Bill cared. Because Tom didn't.

The knock at the door made both of them jump, and Bill was able to tear his eyes away, glad for the pretext. "I wonder if that's Andreas. No, it's probably the pizza! I'll get it," he said quickly, leaping to his feet.

"Bill," Tom said again. His fingertips brushed over Bill's wrist as Bill abandoned ship, hurrying for the door.


	4. Chapter 4

Bill was a romantic who knew that most love stories didn't get a happy ending.

The stories that most people remembered, the ones that everyone could name, were the tragic tales of love torn asunder and passion unrequited. All of the best operas were cut from that cloth; all the enduring plays and novels of supposed literary value were a variation on that theme. The overarching theme that tore at Bill's heart was the notion that the love you found in life was meant to be taken from you, or never meant to be returned.

It ripped him up inside that after all this time, Bill couldn't be satisfied with the status quo. He and Tom were friends, only that much, no matter how much Bill wanted to read into it or whatever weird ideas Tom had gotten recently about experimenting.

On Friday night, Andreas had arrived with a rack of beer not long after Bill had finished counting out the tip into the delivery man's hand. Bill had spent the rest of the night wedged in the corner of the couch trying to ignore Tom's hand settled precariously close to his thigh. After the first movie he'd jumped up and excused himself with the thin claim that he wanted to make the bus before it stopped running. Tom and Andreas had both protested, but they'd been a few beers in and Bill had made his escape heinously early for a Friday by anyone's standards.

The rest of Bill's weekend had been spent in a fury of cleaning and reorganizing his one-room studio apartment, throwing himself at his schoolwork with a vengeance, and spooling through his immense music collection, which was larger by half than his shoe collection. He'd also made a half-assed attempt at winterizing the place, because it was drafty and getting colder by the minute as the days slipped deeper toward the end of autumn.

By Monday morning he turned his phone back on long enough to note that he had eighteen missed calls and forty-eight missed text messages, turned the screen off, and took his bowl of cereal to his desktop computer with a severe lack of enthusiasm for either e-mails or breakfast flakes. He was trying to resign himself to his own assured lack of happy ending, and somehow the intensive spate of cleaning and enumerating all of the reasons why encouraging Tom's foray into bi-curious was a bad idea wasn't doing it for him.

The knock at the door came as a complete surprise. Dropping his spoon into the untouched bowl of cereal, Bill thought fleetingly of all those missed texts and headed for the door, heart thudding a stupidly hopeful beat against his ribs.

"Andi," Bill said somewhat unenthusiastically, after cracking his front door to reveal a slice of best friend. "What's up?"

"Dropping by to see if you're still alive," Andreas said, peering at Bill and lifting a hand as though to check his temp. He drew back when Bill snapped his teeth. "You missed about a thousand texts and we had brunch with some of the girls yesterday."

Now Bill regretted cutting the power on his phone. 'The girls' were some friends from the dorm that he, Tom, and Andreas had lived in during their freshman year, and now that they'd moved out into their own places off-campus, he barely got to see their female friends. "I was...busy," he said lamely, leaning against his door. "I've got to get ready for class. Hey, as long as you're here, can you give me a ride?"

Andreas cocked his head and frowned. "Oh my god, are you looping Coldplay?" he demanded, pushing against Bill's grasp on the door until it slipped and he barged through. "Ugh, you _are_. What is this, something off Parachutes? I've got to get you out of here; the stench of emo in here is overwhelming. Did someone break up with you?"

"Shut up!" Bill exclaimed, both stung and pissed at himself for being unable to come up with a better rejoinder. " _No_ , there's no one to break up; I think I would've told you if I was dating someone."

Andreas cocked his head to the side. "Bill," he said seriously, "come on. Let's go to campus. Turn the stereo off before 'Trouble' does you some kind of permanent damage."

"You're a dick," Bill said, throwing him a pout, but he went to close the WinAmp on his desktop computer before shutting it down.

"Let's go – no, don't go back into the bathroom; you take forever!"

Despite complaints, Bill finished the last touches to his makeup and they made it out the door with plenty of time to get to campus. Andreas's car was parked right out in front of Bill's apartment building and Bill swept the passenger seat free of fast food wrappers and a grungy flannel something-or-other before folding himself in, his knees crammed up near the dash.

"So what's the latest?" Bill asked his friend, thumbing through his missed texts and wondering how much he would miss, realistically, if he just deleted them all.

"I'm staging a coup of the living room," Andreas told him. "Tom won't pick up used Kleenex, and I've been leaving it everywhere."

"That's disgusting," Bill said, wrinkling his nose. "And hardly the latest; you've been doing it since you two moved into that apartment. And Tom's onto you, Andi – he uses your salad tongs to pick them up."

"Damn," Andreas said cheerfully. "Oh, that reminds me...Tom wanted to know if you'd meet him after track practice today." 

"What for?" Bill asked.

Andreas shrugged. "Dunno, he didn't say. But he wasn't sure if he'd be able to meet you for lunch today, so he wanted me to tell you this morning."

"Right," Bill said, and chewed through his top layer of Very Berry lip gloss. "Yeah, whatever. I guess."

"Text him back or something; I don't want him bitching me out."

Bill picked up his phone and fiddled with it. At least some of those texts were from Tom, and he wasn't sure he wanted to read them. He selected Tom's name and looked through the most recent ones anyhow.

_sending andi to check ur place for a body_

_r u alive? meet me aftr track 2day_

_where r u?? ur missing sm good food and our awesomeness_

_bill pick up ur damn phone_

_bill brunch at 11 at panera with our ladeez_

Bill snorted softly and began erasing them. One in particular caught his eye, _why'd you go?? u dont ever leave this early...wanted to ask u smth_ , and he erased that too and turned his screen off with an irritated jab of his thumb. He didn't have it in him to text Tom back right now.

"So what else is new?" he asked absently, resting his chin on the back of his hand and watching the quiet of landscaped suburban neighborhoods give ground to close-packed buildings and concrete sidewalk.

"Tom went out with that Ariel chick and he nailed her, but who's surprised?" Andreas asked rhetorically, turning the wheel sharply to guide his little car onto the strip that would take them to the heart of campus.

"Ugh," Bill said before he could stop himself, and lifted a hand to his mouth. It was none of his business, and hadn't he told Tom to get laid? "Good for him." That only took a bit of effort to choke out.

"Have you talked to Tom at all this weekend?" Andreas asked him. "Hey – keep an eye out on your side of the street for an open parking spot."

"I haven't," Bill said, and realized that was actually weird. Besides Fridays, they usually managed to spend some form of hang-out time together over the course of an entire weekend.

"Oh, okay."

Bill shifted in his seat. He picked at his seat buckle. He examined his nails and buffed them on his jeans to see if the fleck on his ring finger was a scratch or stray lint. Finally, when it didn't appear that Andreas was going to elaborate, he huffed and said, "Why, Andreas? Did I miss something?"

"Nothing," Andreas said hastily. "Only wanted to know if Tom said anything else weird, but since you haven't talked to him..."

"Oh God, what is it this time?" Bill burst out. "It can't be worse than last week."

"You don't want to know," Andreas mumbled. He ignored Bill as he steered next to a newly vacated parking spot and shifted into reverse to parallel-park.

Bill sat back, slipping his thumbnail into his mouth and gnawing delicately on it as he glared through the front windshield. Once safely parked, he got out of the car and slammed the door, then jittered on the curb as Andreas fed the parking meter.

“Just...say it,” he ordered, rocking back and forth from heel to toe and back again. “Out with it, Andi. I don't want him to ambush me with it later, okay?”

Andreas looked up from the parking meter with wide eyes, then checked over his shoulder as though searching for escape routes. “Don't get pissed at me.”

“I can't promise that,” Bill said at once.

Andreas winced as though to say, fair enough. “But I'm just the messenger? All right!” He mock-cringed as Bill lifted his clutch like he was going to throw it at Andreas, and considering the amount of make-up and loose change that Bill had stuffed in there, it would hurt. Leave a welt, at least. “Try to remember that you asked?”

Bill folded his arms and raised a brow. It wasn't very much by way of threatening, but it was the best he had.

“So I walked into the apartment during the One-Night Knockout--” Andreas raised a placating hand as Bill screwed up his entire face in disgust “--and he was kind of, um. He was thinking about you during the, uh. The festivities. He thinks about you when he's screwing his date please don't hit me.” He was raising his hands defensively by the end, catching the look on Bill's face.

"God!" Bill yelled. He kept himself from chucking his clutch at Andreas, but it was a close thing. He stumbled back a step, balling his right hand into a fist. "There is no place in reality where I need to know that, all right?"

"Sorry!" Andreas said. He sounded very sincere.

Bill looked over at him a moment, biting his lip. "How do you know, anyhow? Did he...was he telling you about it again?"

Andreas winced. "I...kind of heard him yelling your name. Near the end. So, yeah. I'd say he's definitely thinking about you when he comes."

"Stop saying that!" Bill groaned, lashing out and socking Andreas in the hollow point of his shoulder. "You can't tell me things like that, even if it's about me. And Tom should keep it to himself if he's got weird fantasies, anyhow."

"Just wanted you to have some warning," Andreas chuckled. He rubbed at his shoulder and hissed. "If he sprang it on you once, he might do it again."

Bill clutched at handfuls of his hair and shook his head. "No. Just, no. I'll punch him in the nuts if he even starts to say it."

Andreas snorted. “Maybe it would do him some good. I don't even know how he salvaged that, with the girl.”

“He doesn't have to,” Bill said with a shrug. “One-Night Knockout, you know? I guess it has some advantages for him.”

“Yeah,” Andreas said. He pulled a face. “He's got amazing luck at picking the girls who don't get all creepy and full-out stalker afterward, too.”

“Right,” Bill said, and stared morosely at the pavement as he headed for the path that would take him toward the building that housed his first class. “I'll see you later, Andi.”

“Try not to punch him!” Andreas called, already walking in the opposite direction. “He might want children some day, or something.”

Bill bared his teeth. He was reconsidering a groin shot, anyhow. He thought it would be much more satisfying to punch Tom in the face.

By the time his eleven o'clock was over, Bill was looking for excuses to stay cooped up in the stuffy dry heat of his basement class, but the teacher's assistant was packed up even before the rest of Bill's classmates were. He didn't have any pretexts to stay, even if he had been able to think of a question on the lecture material. He wasn't friendly with anyone in his sociology class; two of the guys had hit on him and he wasn't interested, three of the girls were openly hostile to him because he was better-looking, and the rest tried to ignore him. Even dawdling over stowing his notebook and pen and mobile could only be stretched out for so long.

Finally, he hitched his backpack onto one shoulder and schooled himself into a mindset where he could meet Tom at the usual place by the building stairs with composure. He flicked the lights off, as the last one to leave the classroom.

“Hey,” a voice said nearby.

“Jesus!” Bill yelped, startling out of his skin. He clutched at the front of his jacket as though that would calm his rabbiting heart rate and turned wide eyes on Tom, who was lounging beside the door to the classroom. “Hey. Tom. What's up?”

“What's up with you?” Tom countered. “Haven't seen you since Friday, and you left really damned early. You okay?”

“I'm fine,” Bill said, reaching up to grip his backpack strap as though it could provide him with moral support. Tom's dark eyes were regarding him keenly, and Bill was worried he might be able to see more than Bill wanted him to, for a change. No matter what Bill thought of it, Tom seemed to be paying more attention to him these days. “Totally fine. I had my phone off; I had a lot to do this weekend, you know? Homework, and winterizing, uh, stuff.”

Tom's intent look shifted to one of concern. “You were winter-proofing your apartment? You could've called me over. Have you ever done that before?”

“I'm not some helpless, delicate flower, Tom; I can handle a simple set of instructions,” Bill snapped, beginning to walk vigorously up the hall.

“Never said you were!” Tom protested, falling into step beside him, catching up to Bill's long-legged strides with ease. “So...did you finish?”

“Finish what?” Bill said in confusion. Tom was licking his lips and that had a woeful track record of making Bill lose his train of thought.

“The winterizing, dummy,” Tom said with an indulgent smile.

“Oh,” Bill said, and rubbed at his head sheepishly.

“You didn't, did you?” Tom continued. He tossed a knowing smirk in Bill's direction.

“Don't be a jerk,” Bill said, lips twitching. “It was really hard. I needed to tack stuff across the windows and I don't have a nail gun. It was heat-activated, but I wasn't going to risk killing my hair dryer for _that._ ”

“Once again, practicality is sacrificed on the altar of fashion,” Tom said, poking a finger in his direction.

Bill slapped at it. “Don't you point fingers at me, mister I-wear-my-pants-below-my-asscrack.”

“Oh, you think about my ass?” Tom said interestedly, and Bill choked on his own saliva.

“Shut up,” Bill croaked, then grimaced without looking over at his friend. “I'm thinking about _kicking_ it, right now; so go out the door first, why don't you?”

Tom only laughed.

The student union was crowded that day, and he and Tom were nearly separated twice in the crush of people. They were both tall guys, though – Tom almost met Bill's six feet of height, and Bill was sure he was still growing – and by the time Bill had his tray of food, Tom had appeared by his side again.

“Ooh Tom, I think I see your girlfriend over there,” Bill said, gesturing randomly across the patio as they made their way to the corner table by the front railing. He had no idea if there was a girl in that direction that Tom had slept with, but the odds were in favor.

“Funny,” Tom said, without looking.

Bill's stomach remembered all at once that he hadn't eaten all day – looking at cornflakes didn't count – and he wolfed down his slice of pizza, licked his fingers, and went for the chicken tenders like they would be on last season's Vogue if he let them sit unattended too long. At some point fries were also involved.

“God, Bill, eat much?”

“Mmfguh,” Bill grunted unresponsively, smothering his last tender in honey mustard sauce and slapping at Tom's hand when his friend reached for his boat of fries.

When he was finished at last and began sucking down Coke to chase the taste of fried grease out of his mouth, he eyed the snickerdoodle cookie sitting on the edge of Tom's plate. “Are you going to...”

“Yes,” Tom said, pulling it back toward himself. Then he shook his head, a slight smile tugging his full mouth upward. “Here.” He broke it in half and tossed it in Bill's direction.

Bill flailed, but he managed to catch it without getting crumbs all over the front of his black shirt.

“Thanks,” Bill said, surprised. Like Bill, Tom was an only child, and wasn't big on sharing.

"You want to go get some ice cream?" Tom offered. "We've got time before our one o'clock."

Bill blinked, considering that as he shoved the entire half of his cookie into one cheek as though he were a squirrel hoarding for winter. "Mmm." He leaned back and patted his belly. "There's still room."

"C'mon, I'm buying," Tom said, reaching across the table and grabbing Bill's tray. He shoved his own halved cookie into his mouth in one immense bite.

"All right, if you're buying, I'm there. Double scoop."

"This isn't a negotiation," Tom protested.

They were halfway down the inner causeway of the student union when Tom reached out and grasped his wrist. "Hey," he said, low-voiced.

Bill blinked at him and licked his lips. His heart was doing that warning squeeze again, the one that told him bolting right now wouldn't be an unwise decision. Better than staying and getting hurt.

“Um,” Tom said. “Meet me after track tonight and come home with me, okay?”

Bill inhaled through his nose and thought about it. “What's up?” he said cautiously, before agreeing to anything.

“Look, Bill...you're not dating anyone right now, yeah?” Tom asked, reaching up and snaring his highest-traffic dreadlock with one finger.

“No,” Bill said, mystified at Tom's sudden nervousness.

“And there's not anyone you like, right now?” Tom pressed. His brown eyes were suddenly intense, boring into Bill's as though seeking to read his thoughts.

Bill shifted his weight from one foot to the other, glancing left as he lied, “You'd be the first to know.” He was growing suspicious, and began to think of excuses to turn down a double date if Tom was going to try to rope him into that. He couldn't stand the notion of being with Tom in a dating context, and even worse, Tom had abysmal taste in girls. Well, he didn't pick the ones with whom he could hold a conversation, that was for sure.

Tom let out a sigh that sounded like a long-held breath. “Okay. Okay. Bill, I want to do it with you.”

Bill opened his mouth, but nothing came out. He blinked, sucked a breath in. Good, the pipes still worked. “...What?”

Tom released the dreadlock he'd been unraveling around his finger and widened his eyes at Bill. “I think we should have sex.”

Wide-eyed, Bill stared at him a moment longer, then he swung out wildly.

"Whoa!" Tom exclaimed, stepping to the side and catching Bill's wrist in mid-air before it got anywhere near Tom's face. "Were you going to punch me?"

"Of course I was, you jackass! You can't just proposition me like that!" Bill cried. "God, Tom. Why are we even friends?"

"Because you love me so much," Tom replied, grinning. He tugged on Bill's wrist, making him stumble toward him.

Bill averted his face, hoping Tom would mistake the rising heat in his hellishly fair skin for anger. "That's assuming a whole _heck_ of a lot," he muttered.

"I'm serious," Tom insisted. "I told you, right? I think about you; I mean, your face when I'm...well, you know."

"When you're coming," Bill supplied flatly. He twisted in Tom's grip, but Tom wasn't letting go.

"So..." Tom continued, and glanced down. He tongued at his lip ring, then licked and bit his lip.

"Tom," Bill groaned, pulling his arm back, but Tom's fingers formed a strong, warm ring around his wrist. His touch burned. Bill's face was filling up with a sudden humiliating flood of heat. "Why?"

Tom inhaled suddenly, his nostrils flaring. "Because I want to?" he said softly, cocking his head to the side and fixing Bill with that look, the warm one that gave Bill the fleeting impression he was the only person in the world that mattered for just those few moments. He stepped into him and Bill failed to step back, and when Tom lifted his other hand Bill flinched, but all he did was stroke his thumb along Bill's cheekbone. "I want to, and I can make it good for you, Bill, so good."

Bill began to struggle again, twisting his face away from Tom and trying to claw out of his grip. "No. No, I can't, I..."

Tom made soothing shushing noises and looked up and down the hall. "Shh, Bill, calm down." He gripped Bill's other wrist. "Come on, Bill, please..."

Bill produced a laugh that was more sob. "Come on? _Tom..._ "

"Are you pissed?" Tom sounded so utterly worried that Bill lifted his head incredulously, peeking through his bangs over at Tom. His friend was biting his lip and did, in fact, look upset. "Look, it's...it's not a big deal, you know?"

Bill sniffed. "Yeah, I guess. Like I would know anything about handjobs in the locker room or whatever."

Tom cracked a smile. "Don't be mad." He waited a moment longer, peering at Bill's face with a look that Bill found touchingly adorable, and if Bill weren't pressed up against the wall he'd be trying to kick his own ass for not holding this against Tom.

"'m not mad," Bill said, folding his arms tightly when Tom released him at last. He looked away.

"But you are a prude," Tom said fondly.

"You dick!" Bill exclaimed, lashing out again, and he must've been moving in slow motion or something because Tom grabbed his wrist again. "It's not prudish, or whatever. Just because I want to wait..."

"See, I think that's part of the problem," Tom told him, his brown eyes earnest. "You shouldn't wait, Bill. You should get in practice, you know? And who better to practice with than..."

Bill's stomach performed a barrel roll. "Than you?"

"Than a good friend that you can trust, who wants to make sure you have a really good first time and isn't in it purely because he's hot for your body," Tom said, a shadow flickering across his face.

Bill stepped into him; elbowed him hard. "Isn't that why you're asking?"

"No!" Tom protested, releasing Bill's wrist again and covering his ribs. He looked down at his shoes. "Not entirely, no. I...I want to try it, with you. And make it good."

"Because you're good," Bill said, struggling to keep his face expressionless.

Tom gave him a slow grin that spread across his whole face, then he tongued at his lip ring again. It was a ridiculously suggestive gesture, it wasn't subtle at all, and the sight of it made Bill's long-frustrated cock stir.

Bill flushed and looked away. He opened his mouth, his skin suddenly feeling about two sizes too small and his tongue three times its normal weight. "I'll think about it," he mumbled, and wanted to cover his face with his hands.

Tom was grinning widely at him now; not a sexy grin but a real grin, the look he got when he was utterly delighted, like the boy who'd gotten the candy from Halloween and the gifts of Christmas wrapped up with a shiny bow. "You won't regret this!" Tom informed him, stepping close again to grip Bill by the shoulders. It wasn't quite a hug and, as Tom hesitated on the verge of moving closer, a big crowd of chattering freshmen swept into the hallway. Tom pulled away. "Let's go get you that ice cream."

Bill watched the dreadlocks bounce at the nape of his neck as Tom turned away, adjusting his backpack higher on one shoulder and digging his other hand into the seat of his jeans in search of his wallet.

"I already do regret it," Bill said, too softly for Tom to hear.


	5. Chapter 5

Bill accepted the ice cream that Tom bought him, then he slipped out from one of the union side doors when his friend stopped to say hi to a track buddy. He hightailed it to the other side of the Quad and proceeded to cut his one o'clock comp lit class.

He wasn't a class-cutter. He hated skipping class; in fact, the last one he'd skipped had been during freshman year when he'd been down with the flu and Tom had purposefully locked him into his own dorm room, and Bill had been too doped up on Nyquil to figure out how to unlatch it from the inside. He'd especially never skipped a class that he shared with Tom, because he genuinely liked being with his friend, stupid crush or no. 

Today he skipped and cut the power on his phone to avoid potential frantic texts from Tom. Bill spent the intervening time between lunch and his last class wedged between a pair of statues at the north end of the art building on the far side of the Quad. He dangled his boots over the ledge that extended from the portico and circled the building, and tried to think about lyrics, the clouds in the sky above him, the skirling red and gold leaves that the chilly wind swept in a chain around him, and everything led back to Tom's face.

_...I want to do it with you._

For the first time in a very long time, Bill let himself think about 'it.' Sex with Tom. And Tom said that he was _good_. Well, of course he was good. He had all that fucking practice.

Bill had to lean back and fan his face and stop thinking about it after a few minutes. Picturing Tom's hand on him, the way he'd probably bite his lip as he concentrated on moving his hand up and down on Bill, the two of them leaning close together and pressing thighs, maybe; Tom's face close enough to duck in and press a kiss to the corner of his mouth... Bill got hard quickly just contemplating it, and he dumped his clutch in his lap and tried to think about unarousing topics like balancing his checkbook, his frumpy eldest aunt in her tweed pantsuit that needed drastic updating, and taking out the garbage during the rancid days of summer.

God, he needed to get laid.

Bill wasn't scared of sex, per se. At least, he didn't think he was. He knew that he did have issues with letting people get close to him, which was one reason for his small circle of close friends and larger list of friendly acquaintances. Also, Bill truly believed that sex was worth waiting for until he found someone that he cared about.

"And I care about Tom," he said aloud softly. Bill kicked his boots out in front of him and glared at the green strip of grass below the ledge. He cared about Tom, but if he had sex with Tom, knowing that his best friend was thinking of it as 'practice,' how could he stand it? 

Tom wanted to try him out, like Bill was a new car and Tom was test-driving him. It was so cold, so businesslike.

_Because you love me so much._

"Fuck you," Bill said aloud, making a couple of heads turn further down the sidewalk. He gave the passersby the finger when they muttered something loud and rude about his 'gay ass,' then he turned his phone on to check the time and grimaced when it began to vibrate. Three missed calls; two from Tom, one from Andreas. Five missed texts.

With a wince, he checked the texts.

_did u go piss? ur gone. ill b on patio_

Bill snorted softly. Charming. He'd always kind of thought he would fall for someone more refined, but somehow he found all of Tom's rough edges to be endearing, utterly boyish. Of the catalogue of hot and fascinating people he'd met and been wooed by, Tom was the one he couldn't get out of his head. Maybe it was partly _because_ Tom was such a punk.

_r u running? u never cut class_

_plz pick up_

_bill...where r u? class starts in 5. im worried_

_Bill, I'm sorry. Andi's gonna call you. Pick up, okay?_

"Shit," Bill said, and turned his screen off. He dropped his phone into his clutch and pushed off the ledge, landing with a wobble on his clunky boots. He recouped his balance and glanced round to make sure no one had caught his moment of gracelessness. Comp lit would be over in about five minutes, and it would be easier for everyone involved if Bill made his way over to his last class early, and avoided the risk of encountering his friends and any potential awkwardness.

He'd told Tom that he would think about it, and he had. Was. _Fuck._ Moreover, his cock was definitely interested in the proposition. He was pretty sure that his cock wasn't taking potential heartbreak into consideration, though.

The bell rang by the time Bill had reached the other side of the Quad. He stepped into the shadow of a tree to check his phone again, meaning to make sure it was on silent mode or maybe to erase his voicemails, and it buzzed in his hand. As he stared at the lit-up display, which informed him he had a new text from Tom, his peripheral vision registered the sight of a tall, dreadlocked figure approaching fast from his right. The phone in Bill's hand told him, _r u going to music? ill b there in a min – WAIT._

There were several potential responses to the text and the fact of Tom bearing down the sidewalk in his direction.

Bill went with the very mature option of hiding behind the tree.

He slipped his sunglasses on as he watched Tom hurry in the other direction, away from him and toward the music building. "I'm an idiot," Bill told himself, and turned his phone off again before stuffing it into his clutch. Tom had to have ditched class early to come running after Bill like that, and the thought made Bill squirm.

Was Tom really so desperate to have sex with him?

Bill bit his lip. It was more likely that Tom was worried he'd genuinely upset Bill – which he had – and damaged their friendship. Which he hadn't, because Bill already knew he'd forgive Tom pretty much anything. If only... "Shit," he said again, softly, and headed for his last class. If he waited much longer he was going to be late. There was a side entrance he could duck into that Tom probably didn't know about.

This wasn't like him. Bill didn't believe in backing down from a problem. His style was to tackle things head-on, and flounder through whatever mistakes that he made in the process. Tom had really thrown him for a fucking loop, though, and Bill knew he was going to have to face it sooner or later. He was going to have to tell Tom he'd thought about it, turn him down, and go back to his virginal lifestyle of countless dates and no release in sight because he _still_ wouldn't like anyone better than Tom.

Or, he could tell Tom 'yes,' and...

Bill groaned and squeezed his eyes shut for a second as he thought about it again. His hand on Tom's cock, the flesh stirring hot and hard in his fingers. Whether Tom had foreskin like Bill, or if he was cut. The faces he might make as Bill jerked him off. If Bill was feeling particularly brave, what it might be like if he licked around the rim and took him in his mouth...

Cheeks hotter than his newly-reawakened libido, Bill hurried into the side entrance of the music building. The disadvantage of his chosen route was that it didn't have elevator access. He clattered up the stairs and reached the top floor as the bell rang. There was a conspicuous absence of Tom. Bill expelled a breath he didn't realize he'd been holding until he reached the upstairs hall and found it empty.

“This is ridiculous,” he chided himself as he lengthened his strides to make it to his classroom's open door. “I'm not a coward.”

Just a virgin.

Bill tripped and nearly faceplanted on the threshold of his music composition class. The teacher looked up in shock, cutting herself off mid-sentence, and the class stared at Bill.

“Sorry, hi. Late. Sorry!”

Georg had gotten to his feet when Bill stumbled through the classroom door.

“What is it?” Georg leaned over to whisper, as Bill dropped into the empty seat beside him. “Bill, are you okay?”

“I got ambushed,” Bill said faintly, and gave Georg a nervous grimace intended to resemble a smile.

"Bill—" Georg began, and Bill hissed and flapped a hand at Georg as the teacher began to speak again. The upperclassman subsided, though he was frowning over at Bill.

That day, the teacher spent half the period on lecture and discussion, and Bill was able to relax at last. His muscles unknotted and he thought in beats and lyrics again instead of dark brown eyes and the silver curl of a lip piercing that drew attention to full, ever so slightly chapped lips. He jotted down phrases in the margins of his notebook that were half poetry and half code, inscribed loops and scrawls of ink that created twisting labyrinths from which there was no return, and inhaled deeply when a touch of woodsmoke on the air seeped through a window that had been cracked open.

By the time the teacher opened the class to a free session to practice what they'd been learning, Bill had unwound to the point that he stared at Georg in confusion when he leaned over and asked Bill if he was all right.

"Of course; why wouldn't I be?" Bill returned.

Georg raised his eyebrows and gave him a faint smirk. "So did I imagine you saying that someone ambushed you, then?"

"Ohhh," Bill said on a slow exhale as his predicament hit him right between the eyes again. There went the relaxed line of his neck and shoulders.

"You know," Georg said, "I'm going to think you're either scatter-brained or a little schizo if you keep forgetting stuff like that. Either that or the guy or girl wasn't very memorable."

Bill sighed.

"You did get hit on, right?" Georg prompted, looking equal parts inquisitive and concerned. "Do you need someone to walk you home?"

Bill contemplated Tom's potential reaction to his leaving the class with a chaperon, and snickered. "That's all right, Georg. I appreciate the offer...and, I kind of got hit on?"

Georg's smirk returned. "What, you're not sure?" His eyebrow wiggle implied that whoever had hit on Bill hadn't been doing it right, to leave the matter in question.

"It was, uh. It was a lot more direct than that," Bill said, grimacing. He raked a hand through his flat-ironed hair and rumpled up some of the shorter strands in back.

"What?" Georg exclaimed, and ducked when half the class swiveled around to glare at him. He raised a hand in a deprecating wave of apology. When he spoke again, he leaned in toward Bill and lowered his voice. "Seriously, Bill, if you're in trouble..."

"No. No! It's nothing like that," Bill insisted. "It's, um. It's actually a guy that I like. A lot." He looked down at his notebook as the heat wave of embarrassment returned to his face. Hell, he bet that his _earlobes_ were flushing by now.

"Oh," Georg said in an entirely different tone.

Bill glanced over at the upperclassman, who was looking out the window with a sudden frown.

“So...are you gonna go for it?” Georg asked curiously.

Bill drew his lower lip between his teeth. “I'm not sure,” he hedged.

"Well," Georg said. "You only live once, right?"

Bill lowered his head and dug his pen into the margins of his notebook again. "Yeah," he replied after a moment. There was something. What if this was the best he got? It was a chance to _be_ with Tom in that way, even if it wasn't reciprocal. Rather, even if Tom didn't feel the same way – and never knew Bill wanted more than Tom's body.

 _Live for each second,_ he scrawled across the top of the page in bold, spiky loops.

He was scared.

That was what it really came down to. Not of sex, he decided – he was willing, even eager for that part. He was scared of what it would mean if he gave his virginity to Tom. He would always remember his first time; he knew that much. He'd wanted to wait because he wanted it to matter, to be with someone who mattered in a permanent and life-altering way.

He already knew that he'd remember Tom for the rest of his life, though. Would it be such a bad thing to remember him for this, too?

"Hey," Georg said, near the end of class when Bill had begun to watch the clock.

"Mm?" Bill responded, looking up from his phone as he thumbed it back on.

"You putting something up for the competition?"

Bill inhaled sharply and sat bolt upright in his seat. "Right," he said slowly. "The Lehardt Awards. I totally forgot that was coming up at the end of the semester."

"You should think about it," Georg advised, giving him one of his encouraging grins.

Bill grinned back, a little, and started to relax again when his phone's screen lit up and let him know he didn't have any new texts or missed calls. Tom had track practice after class, so Bill had a couple of hours yet. He'd wait at the little coffee shop across the street from campus by the school bookstore, and then he'd meet Tom and they'd talk. He could do this. Maybe.

Or he could go home, lock the door, pull the covers over his head, and defer everything until tomorrow while he jerked himself off until he was raw.

"You look a little peaky," Georg commented.

"Do I?" Bill said breathlessly. He was thinking about it again; this time, re-visiting his speculation over whether Tom's come-face looked anything like how rapt he got when he fingered his guitar.

When the bell rang, Bill took his sweet time about stuffing his belongings into his backpack. He reflexively checked his phone one more time before dropping it back in his clutch, and was unsurprised to find Georg waiting for him beside his desk.

"It's okay, Georg; really," he assured the older boy. Bill was taller by several inches, but Georg was solid and looked plenty muscular, and Bill was abruptly flattered that Georg cared enough to make chivalrous gestures.

"Oh, yeah," Georg said with a brief smile. "Because you like him, right?"

Bill looked down at his backpack, twisting it between his hands before hefting it up and securing it over his shoulder. "Right," he replied. In the pit of his stomach, the beginning of certainty was making itself known. Too bad his emotions were still tangled as the lines of ink he'd coiled up and around the margins of his notebook.

"Okay, then...see you," Georg said with a little wave.

Georg took the stairs, obviously headed for the side entrance, and Bill had to wait for the elevator. His preceding classmates had already taken the car down. Bill hummed to himself as he waited, and realized with a jolt that it was the mournful tune that Tom had played for him the other night, the desperate ode to longing that had made Bill demand another song.

Maybe that was his answer.

He couldn't always ask for another song until he got the one he wanted. Still humming, Bill pushed open the front door of the music building when he reached the first floor. It was only Monday, he was thinking; the week was still young and anything could change—

"Aghh!" Bill flailed as he was seized by the upper arm. He whirled, whacking at his assailant with his clutch.

"Stop that! Bill!" Dark brown eyes flashed panic-wide in his direction.

Bill squeaked and dropped his arm as he registered the solid strength of Tom beside him, grasp on his arm radiating heat through Bill's shirt. "You idiot!" Bill exclaimed, fetching Tom another whack with his clutch for good measure.

"Will you stop beating me with your purse, damn it?" Tom demanded.

"It's not a _purse_ ," Bill said between his teeth, smacking him one more time. He jerked his arm out of Tom's grip, and Tom let him sidle away. 

"Murse?" Tom suggested, folding his arms across the front of his over-sized hoodie.

Bill couldn't contain the eyeroll; didn't really want to try. "It's a clutch. And it's unisex, you Neandertal. What are you doing here?"

"Making sure you don't keep ditching me," Tom said, blunt.

“What about track?” Bill asked desperately.

“I'm skipping track,” Tom informed him.

“You never skip track,” Bill murmured.

“Yeah? You never ditch class, but you did today,” Tom observed. “If I go to track without settling this you'll run again, and...I'm worried I might never catch you. I want to settle this, Bill.”

Bill tsked. "What do you want me to say, Tom? You kind of sprang this whole thing on me--"

"Not really," Tom said, eyes boring into his.

"Okay, not really," Bill admitted. Tom had been working up to it since last Wednesday.

They were both quiet for a moment. Tom was looking right at him, and Bill kept trying to shift his focal point but he always came back to Tom's eyes on him; he couldn't help himself. It was like gravitational pull. Knowing that Tom would be looking back at him was half the allure.

"I want you to say yes," Tom said after a moment. He wasn't even smiling. He was so serious.

Serious about Bill, but for the wrong reasons. That stiffened his spine.

“You know I'm waiting for the right person,” Bill said quietly.

Tom was nodding as Bill finished his sentence. “Yeah, see, I think that's an excuse.”

“What? How can you--”

“An excuse,” Tom repeated, louder, speaking over Bill's protestation. “It lets you put people off. You don't let people in, Bill. Meanwhile you've built sex up into this sacred experience, making it more than it is.”

Bill frowned at Tom, but he couldn't argue. Not when Tom was pretty much nailing the thoughts Bill himself had had earlier that afternoon.

“It's just...it's sex, Bill. You should try it.”

“With you.” Bill folded his arms.

Tom tipped his head to the side. “Yeah, I...yeah.” Now he gave Bill a little smile that rated somewhere between sheepish and sultry.

“I don't want things to get weird,” Bill said at last, low, offering up a reason that Tom would be able to accept. That was a big part of it, of course. The fact that it was already weird because of Bill's one-sided yearning, and now Tom wanting him physically...that didn't need to be brought up.

Tom's eyes widened. “They won't! Bill...”

“I mean, does it...does that really happen; guys giving each other handjobs then continuing with their friendship like nothing happened...?” Bill continued dubiously, recalling what Georg had said to him the other day. Now Bill was picturing _Georg_ giving some faceless guy a handjob, and he wanted to sink right through the concrete sidewalk.

“It does!” Tom hastened to assure him. “All the time!”

Bill fixed on Tom again, mouth dropping open. “Have _you_...”

“God, no!” Tom said, sounding appalled. He grimaced, then tilted his head to the side and regarded Bill with open appraisal. “None of the guys I've ever been around were as gorgeous as you, Bill.”

Bill flushed and found a sudden rapt absorption in the toes of his boots. “Shut up.”

“I mean it,” Tom persisted, edging close to him. He cupped Bill's elbow and this time, Bill didn't jerk away. “You're the most gorgeous guy...the most beautiful _person_...I've ever seen, Bill.”

Bill glanced over at Tom through his lashes as his insides performed a sickly hot swoop. "I can't just..."

"You can," Tom said, coaxing. "I told you, I'll make it good for you, Bill. Then you can be more, you know, relaxed about the whole thing, okay? You'll see."

Bill frowned, then he got it. Tom meant Bill's whole 'looking for the One' thing. It was another pinprick burst in the dream-bubble impression that this could be anything other than what it was. Tom was straight, and Bill was now acting like the kind of self-deluded fairy that made him throw popcorn at the TV screen.

"Tom, I..." Bill began, and stopped. He knew what he had to say now. What would it mean to him, to have sex with someone he loved who didn't love him back? When did he start classifying his crush upward? He shifted his backpack higher on his shoulder and struggled with the actual words. For all his articulation when he didn't give a rip, he kind of sucked at finding the right phrasing when it really mattered.

Tom sucked his lower lip into his mouth briefly then his face shuttered. "It's okay, I get it," he said coolly.

Bill was watching his best friend assume the politely distant mask of a stranger right before his eyes. It was a sucker punch. He almost elbowed Tom and cracked, 'oh my god, you've really never been turned down, have you?' and trapped the bead of his tongue stud between his teeth instead. "I didn't even say anything yet," Bill offered with a tentative smile, a peace offering.

They could keep on as they had, and neither of them got what they wanted. Or Bill could give Tom what he wanted.

Tom huffed through his nose and looked away, scratching at his nape below the pile of dreadlocks. He was still touching Bill's elbow, his long fingers warming Bill's skin through his shirt, then he looked back at Bill, now taking the lack of immediate rejection for something positive. He gave him a sidewise grin that managed to come across both assured and oddly shy. "It's just you and me, okay? So you won't have to be nervous."

"Tom," Bill said again, and it wasn't a no; and as they shifted to lock eyes, Bill could tell that they both knew it.

"Please give me a try, Bill," Tom said, lowering his lashes. They were sinfully thick, almost better than Bill could manage with mascara.

"And you'll stop bothering me about it if I don't like it," Bill said, raising his clutch although it was a pretty poor excuse for a threat, if Tom thought it was a _murse._

Tom grinned at him, bit at his lip ring briefly, and raised the hand he'd been using to cup Bill's elbow. He held up one crooked pinky finger. "Okay, okay. And you won't run away," he adds. "Promise me?"

Bill regarded Tom warily. "From what?"

"This. Me. What we're doing," Tom clarified.

"Me, running?" Bill said, his protestation weak even to his own ears.

Tom raised a single brow.

Bill ducked his head and flushed. "Okay, I've been running," he said in a small voice.

"And you won't run anymore," Tom prompted, holding his crooked finger out like an offering.

Bill reached up and slowly, slowly hooked his smallest finger around Tom's. "And...and you'll stop if I freak," he added. "If I don't want to do it anymore."

"If you're really freaking," Tom said, close enough to send warm breath coursing over Bill's cheek. "As long as you're not trying to run away."

"How will you know the difference?" Bill said dubiously.

"Because I pay attention to you," Tom whispered back. He squeezed Bill's pinky finger, looking down at their twined digits, and there was an obscure little smile on his lips. "It's a promise."

"Promise," Bill agreed, and his cheeks were warm with more than Tom's nearness. He was giving it up for a damned pinky swear; it was a level of ridiculous that he could only find adorable when Tom was involved. He lowered his eyes and wondered, hoped, thought he was about to be kissed.

Tom broke away from their closeness, shifting his grip from Bill's pinky to his wrist. "Come on, we've got a bus to catch, okay?"

"Right now?" Bill squeaked, caught off-guard even though this was what they'd been leading up to all day.

"No running away," was Tom's instant response.

"How about I kick your ass?" Bill offered.

Tom grinned at him as he half-tugged, half-led him up the sidewalk. "That's my Bill."


	6. Chapter 6

Tom's thigh was pressing against his. It had been ten minutes and Bill was stuck on that fact. They were on the bus and it was mostly-empty, but Tom was crowded close against Bill on the seat beside him as though they had to be packed tight as sardines to fit. Bill was already pressed up against the metal rail that divided his seat from the one beside him, so he couldn't scoot any further over. If he was honest with himself, he'd admit he didn't actually want to. He really did enjoy having Tom tucked so close beside him, as though he had as much of Tom's attention as possible.

"How was your music class?" Tom asked suddenly, after several minutes of dead air crackled between them.

"Oh, um. Fine," Bill said. He reached up to tug nervously at his hair. They were going to do it. He and Tom...his cheeks were hot again and he ducked his head. "Sorry I skipped comp lit earlier."

"It's okay, I get it," Tom said, and his arm snaked along the back of the seats, pressing a solid line against Bill's shoulders.

Tom had done this much before. This wasn't unusual behavior for Tom, at all. Never had Bill been so acutely aware of each nuance, though. He was pretty sure they had sat together on buses like this before, but now Tom's thigh was snug against his, warming him faster than the tepid air blowing from the bus heater vents, and they were going to _do_ it.

"I...I, uh, did you take notes?" Bill croaked. "During comp lit?"

Tom gave him an odd look, wetting his lower lip with his tongue. "Well, yeah," he said it like a matter of course. "But you'll want Andi's, because I was...kind of distracted during today's lecture."

"Distracted," Bill began, then looked away, biting his lip. "Right. Sorry."

"Don't apologize," Tom said, and he sounded so close to Bill's ear that Bill squeaked a little and brought his face up in surprise, nearly bumping his nose into Tom's.

Bill held his breath and wondered if he should shut his eyes as Tom's eyes moved from Bill's and traveled on down his face, settling on his mouth. Bill's eyes flickered out the window instead as the moment held, both of them unmoving.

"Stop," he said aloud, eyes widening.

"What?" Tom said, sounding injured.

"It's your stop," Bill elaborated. He grabbed at the metal rail and raised himself awkwardly from his seat, reaching for the plastic string that would signal the bus driver and yanking at it. A yellowed plastic panel lit up at the front of the bus, 'Stop Requested,' and Bill wobbled, clutched at the rail, and gathered up his things. He began to totter toward the front of the bus, irked that his heels screwed with his sense of balance but determined to capably navigate the strip of rubber flooring to make it to the front before the bus reached a complete stop. One hand rubbed at his own thigh; maybe he was imagining it, but he thought it was still warm from having Tom's pressed up against him.

"Right," Tom muttered behind him, scooping his backpack from the seat.

More silence ensued as they made the half-block walk from the bus stop to Tom and Andreas's apartment, and Bill was beginning to reconsider the choice he'd made. This silence, it wasn't what he wanted. It wasn't usual for them. He opened his mouth.

"Don't talk my ear off, or anything," Tom said, reaching up to tug at one of his dreadlocks, and that was when it hit Bill.

This wasn't awkward only for him. In fact, maybe Tom was even...nervous?

"I'm not really sure what you want me to say," Bill admitted, twisting his backpack strap under his hand to the point he risked breaking a nail. He was fixated forward on the crucial moment. "I mean, we're gonna...is Andreas out for the afternoon?" He interrupted himself, now terrified at the prospect of his other guy friend being present and potentially capable of witnessing Bill's first walk of shame.

"He's got a closing shift tonight," Tom said, looking entirely too satisfied about that.

Bill thought about smacking him with his clutch again, but Tom would only protest he hadn't done anything wrong. Bill was complicit now; he'd promised his virginity away.

"Hmm, okay," was all he said in response. Maybe it was a good thing after all. It wouldn't let him delay to the point of over-thinking or allowing him violate his promise to not run away.

"So was it because of me you bailed out early on Friday?" Tom asked out of nowhere.

"I was starting to get worried you'd jump me on the couch," Bill admitted with a small laugh. "You were crowding me, Tom; and Andi was about half passed out in his armchair, the booze-hound. God, I was getting hives just thinking about it."

"But you were thinking about it," Tom stated.

"Um." Bill gnawed on his lower lip. What point in denying it now? "Well, yeah. It was hard not to."

Tom was wearing a faint smile when he pulled ahead of Bill to unlock the door.

As it swung open, Bill's eyes widened. This was the One-Night Knockout. _He_ was the knockout. "Oh my God," he said under his breath, hopefully too weakly for Tom to hear.

"You want to take the shower first?" Tom asked him, ushering him inside with the press of a hand to the small of his back.

"First?" Bill parroted, certain he was missing something.

"Yeah, I need to shower," Tom said, scrunching his face up and putting a hand up to his nape. "I mean, not like I had track or anything but I haven't since before brunch yesterday, so..."

"Right," Bill said, nodding until he was sure his head would come unhinged. Tom would shower, and then they would...he had to sit down. Maybe put his head between his knees. "But why do I have to shower?" He was clean; he'd bathed that morning, he was relatively sure he still smelled good. The vanilla body wash he used was very long-lasting. Or he could go. Home. To his own shower, and have a nice warm one this time instead of an ice-cold run.

"Um," Tom said. "Because if I go to shower, you might probably just leave." He looked apologetic as he said it.

Bill tried to seem surprised, as though he hadn't been contemplating exactly that.

"I...guess," he said vaguely, because the thought of a freshly-showered Tom was very appealing to him. Already he could imagine playing connect-the-mole while chasing stray water droplets with his tongue, a thought that had hovered nearby when shirtless Tom had answered the door last Friday. If he had to take a quick shower – and Tom would probably creep in and take his clothes hostage; it was just his style – in order to get more shirtless, shower-fresh Tom, he supposed it was a sacrifice that he was willing to make.

"Great," Tom said, his face lighting up.

With a speed that made his head swirl, Bill found himself standing before an open bathroom doorway with Tom handing him clean towels and an unopened bar of soap. He was reluctantly awed at how Tom had covered all of the bases, not only taking such good care of him but closing him off from potential escape routes. He found himself wondering if Tom was this thorough, this thoughtful, with girls that he slept with and that only made him get pissed at himself again, so he tried to squash that kind of curiosity.

He undressed, eyed his skinny, undefined body in the mirror and hoped that Tom wouldn't be too disappointed that he was surely unlike any girl that Tom had ever slept with even if he did have a prettier face, then stuck his tongue out at his pale reflection.

The soap wrapper wasn't labeled, but when Bill stripped it off as he ran the water, he sniffed it and smiled at the odors of vanilla and amber, and a faint hint of...maybe coconut? They were all scents he loved. Either Tom was way more detail-oriented than he'd realized, or...or something Bill didn't think he was ready to face head-on yet.

He adjusted the shower spray, climbed in, and sighed happily. The warm spray hit him at mid-chest and when he twisted around to wet his head under the spray, the muscles in his back began to un-knot and loosen at last.

Bill heard the door click quietly when he was reaching for the conditioner. He grinned at the beige tiles, certain that Tom had come in to snatch his clothes.

When the shower curtain rings rattled and a blast of cooler air hit him, Bill yelped. His hands were occupied, buried in his damp hair as he worked conditioner through the ends, and he was _naked_ so he sure as hell wasn't going to turn around with it swinging out in the cold.

"Tom, what are you _doing!?_ " Bill screeched, twisting to eye Tom up with what would surely be the most unconvincing glare in the history of ever, then realizing Tom was barefoot all the way up to his collarbones. Heat slammed into Bill's face and he swiveled forward again, his heart taking off like a train going off its rails.

"Saving time," Tom said, utterly casual about it as he tugged the curtain shut behind him.

"Y-You're naked," Bill said, sidling forward until the spray hit him high on the chest. He peeked over his shoulder. His hands were still tangled up in his wet, conditioner-slick hair and he made a weak effort to hurry up and finish his hair. "Ohh, you're so naked." He liked what he saw, of course; and there was definite interest on Tom's part from the not so little glimpse he'd managed.

"Keep doing what you're doing," Tom instructed him, his hands going to Bill's wet hips.

"You're sure this is going to save time?" Bill mumbled, but it was a facetious question. He knew Tom wouldn't be washing his own hair, after all; Bill knew more about the care and feeding of dreadlocks than someone who didn't have them should ever be forced to suffer. He had spent his share of hours on the couch with Tom between his knees on the floor as he waxed and tightened Tom's dreads while they had a movie on.

"Uh-huh," Tom confirmed, pressing against him.

That was _not_ his hip poking against Bill's ass.

"T-Tom, you can't just..." Bill began, pulling his hands out of his hair and fluttering for lack of something to do with them. Breathily he continued, "...ambush a guy like that..."

"Not ambushing," Tom disagreed, molding himself even closer to Bill's backside and setting his chin on Bill's shoulder. One hand dipped over the curve of Bill's waist, thumb stroking down along Bill's hipbone and stripping water off it. Without any hesitation, he reached down between Bill's thighs.

"Oh..ahhh," Bill moaned, jumping a little as Tom's hand closed around his cock. He was tense for the first few pulls then it was so good, the touch of another's hand wrapping and wringing sensation from his dick in ways a little different from the way he stroked himself but not the less skilled for it. He melted against the hard body behind him and groaned as sheer sensation overrode everything; embarrassment, awkwardness, the fright that this would wreak an inexorable change in a relationship he treasured. 

All those thoughts took a backseat to the way Tom's fingers explored the shape of him, thumbed expertly at his foreskin and twisted around the exposed head, and took him in a firm grip to create a tight channel for Bill to thrust against as it moved up and down. Bill sagged back against Tom and tried to shut his eyes but it was so good, too good. He looked down through the beat of spray cascading over his front and watched Tom's hand move over his cock.

A hand stroked over the nape of his neck, moving Bill's conditioner-laden hair away and off to the side. Tom leaned against him a little harder, digging into him, and Bill didn't even have a blush in him anymore. His knees weakened and he sagged back against Tom.

Tom's hand moved faster, and his other arm went around Bill, both propping him and holding him against Tom's body. Lips brushed the back of Bill's nape and Bill watched Tom's knuckles go back and forth, back and forth, then a drawn-out groan unraveled from the depths of him as he watched come arc from the tip of his dick as detachedly as though it were someone else's body.

"Oh," Bill said, or half-moaned. "Oh, God."

Tom's lips were on the side of his neck now, and Bill shifted, shaking his head a little. Tom drew back, probably to avoid assault by conditioner.

"Been a while?" Tom said, a smirk in his voice.

"No-o-o," Bill lied, even though it was true he hadn't let himself masturbate in ages. He'd been kind of afraid that if he started, he wouldn't leave his apartment for a week or until his dick fell off after giving up the fight to chafing. "No, it's just..." _You're too fucking hot,_ he could say, or _you're amazingly good at that,_ and opted for neither, because Tom's ego was plenty large enough without an extra serving from Bill.

He stepped to the side, turning until Tom's hardness was digging into his hip instead of uncomfortably nestled against the cleft of his ass, and began to rinse the conditioner out of his hair. When he did and his hair was soaking beneath the spray, Tom moved in, pushing his face close to Bill's.

Bill panicked and pushed the heel of his hand into Tom's shoulder as he moved in for a kiss at last. "Stop, no," Bill said, flustered. "We...we don't need to kiss when I'm just going to give you a handjob." It was too intimate, he decided. Now that they were at the crucial moment, if he was ever going to look Tom in the face again after this, they couldn't share that much.

"Just a handjob?" Tom repeated, astonishment scrawled over his face. "No way. Who said anything about just handjobs? That was the warm-up, Bill. We're going all the way; I want to have sex with you."

Bill gaped at him and water trickled down the side of his face, getting into his mouth. He reached up, running his hands through his hair to make certain all of the conditioner was gone, then he reached out and hauled the curtain aside, uncaring at this point as to whether he got water all over the floor or not. "You can take care of the rest yourself, I'm sure," he said, dragging the curtain shut after him and snatching up one of the two towels that had been laid out for him.

"Bill!" Tom called out, and cursed. The sounds of frantic scrubbing and splashing ensued.

Before Bill could make his escape from the bathroom, the water shut off. He barely had his head towel wrapped securely by the time Tom stumbled out of the bathtub, cursing again, hesitating, and grabbing his own towel when he saw that Bill's hips were chastely wrapped.

"I think we need to talk about our expectations," Bill said, his voice wavering.

"Come on, Bill, did you really...you thought I meant just handjobs?" Tom asked him, his voice disarmingly gentle.

Bill moved to get the door but Tom was faster, stretching out an arm to lean against it and trap it shut.

"I...I thought..." Bill faltered, and shut his eyes. Tom was too near him, his body heat radiant, and the way his tongue flicked over his lower lip was a spike to Bill's vitals. "I guess, I don't know what I thought." Damn Georg and his locker-room handjobs talk, anyhow. Somehow Bill had convinced himself that was all Tom was expecting from this encounter.

"Come here," Tom told him, still in that same easy tone. He stroked his hand over Bill's shoulder, down his side, maneuvering Bill until he turned away from the door and was facing Tom, so little space between them that they were practically chest to chest. 

"I want to have sex with you," he told Bill seriously. "Not handjobs. All the way."

"You...in me?" Bill ventured, and something leapt inside of him; his belly was hot and excited, even as the suffocating sensation in his chest closed up tighter.

Tom licked his lip and nodded.

"No," Bill told him, pushing at Tom's chest. "No, no...I can't."

"You said you wouldn't run away," Tom reminded him, caressing up the curve of Bill's back above the towel. "Come on. You want to." He gripped near the front top edge of the towel, where Bill's proof of renewed physical excitement, at least, was nudging up the fabric.

Bill shook his head, still trying to push away. "No...no, I don't."

The hurt look on Tom's face shocked Bill to stillness. It cut Bill up in places no physical touch could reach. "You don't?"

Bill was very much aware of the pulse thundering beneath his fingertips where they still rested below Tom's collarbone. Tom's heart was going so fast, straining beneath the slim golden line of his breastbone, proving that he wasn't nearly so self-assured as he wanted to appear. Perversely, it relaxed Bill.

"I'm scared," Bill whispered, looking down and tracing visually over the glistening line of water that remained in scattered droplets clinging to the finest of hairs, trailing from Tom's navel on downward. He wanted to brush his fingers there, and he knew that Tom would let him. Hell, he'd encourage Bill; he'd push his hand down further.

"Scared to do it with me? But..."

Scared because Bill knew it meant more to him than it would to Tom, and where that would leave them. Could they still be friends? What if Tom hated it?

...What if he _liked_ it?

Bill started to shake his head and Tom pressed against him, bringing their chests together, closing the distance and skimming lips over his cheekbone. Bill caught his breath and tilted his head, inadvertently bringing his face into alignment as Tom changed the angle and kissed him again. Their lips met for the first time.

The shock of it traveled clear through him and Bill gasped, trying to withdraw, but Tom pursued and caught Bill's bottom lip between both of his. Bill turned his face to the side, heart thudding loud enough to rush fast and hollow at all the places where the skin was thinnest, a pulse he could feel and Tom could touch.

"It's just me. It's still me, don't be scared," Tom whispered against Bill's ear, then flicked his tongue against the outer shell. "Come on, I want to show you how good it is."

Bill couldn't say anything, this time. He let his head lapse against Tom's shoulder and all he could do was nod as he grabbed at Tom's towel, holding onto it, letting his knuckles brush the firm skin of Tom's belly.

"Come on," Tom said. "Let's go to bed."


	7. Chapter 7

Tom was kissing Bill, as Bill tried to re-learn how to breathe.

They relocated from the bathroom to Tom's bed and Bill recalled very little of the transition. He knew the presence of Tom's mouth, firm against his; the wetness of tongue against Bill's lips and palate and even his teeth, and the way that Tom kissed Bill hungrily, like he couldn't get enough. Bill was barely aware that they were in motion. It was as though the world was comprised of the way their mouths connected, and Tom's hand on his face, thumb stroking over his cheekbone, and the hand on the small of his back that tugged him along as they moved. Tom licked his way into Bill's mouth and Bill kissed back with little desperate noises; he had always loved kissing, and thought that the way a person kissed could tell him a lot about them.

Tom kissed Bill more thoroughly than he ever had been in his life, steamy kisses that made him feel as though he were spinning, or the world was, as Tom licked at the seam of his mouth and nipped at Bill's lips with his own. The backs of Bill's knees were hitting a bed and Tom laid him against the spread, tugging his towel to set it aside.

Bill leaned up on his elbows, flushed but determined. Tom had seen all of him, so it was Bill's turn. "I want to see it," he insisted, fearlessly greedy for the moment. He sat up and whipped Tom's towel away before he could think about it too hard. He sucked in a breath; it was _right there_ , and just like his, foreskin and all. It was hard already, half-upright. If he moved forward even a little it would bump against his face. He looked up and Tom's eyes were dark, waiting.

Bill reached out and took Tom's cock in hand, thumbing down the foreskin the way he liked to, a little less intimidated for all the similarities. It flexed in his hand and Bill grinned, eyes flicking up to Tom, who had his lip caught between his face and looked a little pained, though it was most certainly not painful.

"Is that good?" Bill ventured boldly, moving his hand up and down.

"Uhh..." The exhalation was definitely encouraging, and Bill moved his hand in firmer strokes, adding a little twist at the end.

"You have no idea," Tom groaned, pushing into his hand.

"I have a pretty damned good idea," Bill corrected. He moved his hand faster, and brought the other to stroke down curiously over Tom's balls. The anxiety he thought he'd have to contend with was gone as he appraised what he had in his hands. Exactly the same. Tom was a little wider than he was, but just as long. Same shape. The wet tip of him appeared as Bill stretched down the foreskin and he paused, looking at the pre-come that was pooling at the tip, wondering what Tom's reaction would be if he leaned over and licked it off.

As he hesitated, still contemplating it, hands settled on his shoulders. "Bill," Tom uttered in a strangled voice, pushing him back onto the bed and climbing atop him, a knee between his thighs.

"Oh," Bill began, and his surprised utterance was smothered by Tom's mouth as he pressed their bodies together. He didn't know what he would have said. 'Sorry?' It didn't apply. 'Wait, let me?' He almost thought he'd wanted to.

Skin to skin contact was amazing, the delicious realization spread through him as he lit up everywhere they touched, the sensation thrilling along his nerves and staying with him like a smoldering burn. He had as much of Tom spread against him as possible, _naked_ Tom, and their mouths were fused together again as Tom swiped his tongue in and gripped at his shoulders, pressing him down into the bedspread and grinding against his hip.

Bill's hands sought out Tom's lower back, stroking against damp skin. He moaned and opened to Tom's tongue as they moved together.

Tom moved again, harder, and Bill thought he might pass out for a moment as blood rushed with a vengeance for southern territory. He nudged his hips up against Tom and threaded his tongue stud into Tom's mouth, pressing the bead of it along Tom's tongue, the roof of his mouth until Tom made another pained noise, but he wasn't pulling away. He ground against him and they moved in tandem, and Bill knew what it was to get sucked into passion for the first time as they began to thrust desperately. He couldn't control the motions of his hips; they were pushing up all on their own.

Tom groaned in a way that Bill had never heard before, pulling his lips away from Bill's and licking them, his eyes dazed as their gazes connected. Bill arched up, making a small desperate noise, seeing only the way Tom's eyes were drowning in pupil. He rubbed over Tom's lower back and tried to get him to thrust harder, faster, as his cock hardened even more. His balls were tighter, tingling, but he knew it would be a while until he could climax again thanks to the way Tom had worked him over in the shower. The 'warm-up,' Tom had said.

"Bill," Tom said, turning his name into a moan. "I want to..." He caressed his hand down from Bill's shoulder and stroked down his ribs, his side, insinuating his hand between Bill's back and the bedspread.

Tom's hand brushed over the top of his left butt-cheek and it lifted Bill out of the fog of sensation that he'd descended into. It made Bill remember what they'd talked about and drew him into an immediate realization of all that portended. Tom wanted to have sex with him; Tom wanted to get inside him. With his cock. In Bill's _ass._

The lips on Bill's went still, as though kissing was an after-thought now as Tom's hand curved to fit over Bill's butt, cupping him firmly, almost possessively. As his fingers squeezed, Bill pictured the reality, something invading him back there where he tried to spend the least amount of time even when showering, and it was a no-go. Absolutely impossible.

"No!" Bill squealed, tossing his head. "I changed my mind, this is a bad idea! I don't want your dick anywhere near my ass, Tom. Forget it, handjobs are good enough." He averted his eyes, so that he wouldn't have to see Tom's disappointed stare.

Tom's breath caught. "Okay," he said after a long moment of silence.

"Okay?" Bill repeated, a little outraged that Tom had given up so easily. This was what he wanted, wasn't it? "Wait, you're just...it's fine?"

Tom blinked at him slowly. "Well, you said you don't want to," he said, and leaned forward to press a moist kiss on Bill's lower lip. All the while his hand continued to massage Bill's butt-cheek and it felt soothing, now, instead of intrusive. As though he wanted to make Bill feel good, and wasn't solely concerned with getting in there. "I guess we could just..." He pressed their bodies together, hauling Bill close with the firm grip on his ass.

Bill's mouth fell open as their cocks ground together, rubbing, tips meeting in a wet kiss. Tom's other hand was between their bodies, going around their cocks and pressing them together even more firmly and making Bill's eyes flutter at the sensory overload. Tom's fingers dug into the crease of his ass, moving rhythmically, rocking them together, and Bill began to see how he could come from only this much stimulation, as long as they kept doing it long enough. If Tom's lips connected with his again...

"Why would anyone want to do that?" he mumbled, no longer upset but definitely curious. He understood why Tom wanted to do it – a hole was a hole, right? But why would a guy _let_ another guy...

Tom chuckled warmly, kissing his chin, moving up and kissing his jaw. "Bill, don't you know anything about gay sex?"

"I'm not _gay_ ," he protested, eyes flashing open. "I'm bi, Tom, it's a little different!"

"Right, bisexual and fabulous," Tom murmured, and his voice was teasing, affectionate. It was such a normal exchange, so _them_ , and their eyes connected and Bill was warm clear through. No, God; he was burning up and Tom wasn't just fanning the flames. He was the source of the fire.

Nevertheless Bill grinned over at him, heart squeezing abruptly painful in his ribs like a sucker punch as Tom moved in to rub their noses together. "How do you know what's so great about it?"

Tom rolled off to the side, stroking Bill's hip now instead of his ass. "I looked stuff up, you know," he said, looking anywhere but Bill as he drew his lip ring into his mouth briefly. His cheeks colored as Bill watched in helpless fascination.

Bill shifted onto his side on the bedspread to face Tom and he didn't even blush as his hard cock poked his friend in the belly. He wanted _answers._ Just how long had Tom been thinking of sexing him up, anyhow?

"It's supposed to feel really good," Tom said, glancing over to Bill then away, then back again. "You know. Your prostate. When I touch it."

Heat slammed back into Bill's face as he made the mental connection. Tom's fingers in his ass. Tom's _cock_ pressing in, riding against... "Oh, ohh, umm..." And it wasn't an entirely unpleased noise, because it most certainly was not an unpleasant thought somehow. Because it was Tom? Or...

"Haven't you ever fingered yourself?" Tom continued hopefully.

"Have you?" Bill retorted.

Tom looked away, eyes widening. "We're not talking about me right now," he said too quickly.

"You have?" Bill exclaimed, shocked. Fingering one's own ass certainly wasn't the kind of activity he associated with someone straight like Tom, no matter how curious. He grinned and shifted closer, spanning his hand over Tom's ribs below his right nipple, unsure if he was going to tickle or caress him.

The spark of mischief must've transmitted to Tom loud and clear, because he growled and rolled his body against Bill's again, crushing him to the bedspread beneath his weight. He wasn't heavy; in fact it was a pleasant pressure, especially when he adjusted their positions so that their cocks met again.

"Shut up," Tom ordered, flustered. "I, I wanted to make sure I could hit it when I..." He broke off and dipped his head, loose dreadlocks brushing over Bill's face and throat, and attached his lips to Bill's neck. He thrust and Bill moaned, and they both started moving again.

Tom started to move down his neck, his collarbone, blazing a path with tiny sucking kisses. Bill wasn't done yet, though. There was still more he needed to know.

"So was it any good?" he persisted, tugging at one of Tom's dreadlocks before he remembered all the times Tom had complained he hated it when girls grabbed his hair during sex.

Tom's eyes flashed up at him, all pupil again. "Like you wouldn't believe," he murmured, low-voiced. He bent over Bill's chest and took a nipple into his mouth.

Bill cried out hoarsely as Tom sucked on his nipple, drawing it up firm between his lips. It was like being broken by a bolt of lightning then remade into something molten and brilliant; he bucked his hips and pressed his renewed hard-on against Tom's stomach. He'd never played with his own nipples and had never thought they would be a particularly intense pleasure. He imagined them to be secondary at best; worth skipping most times. Tom was proving him blissfully wrong as he lashed at Bill's nipple with repeated strokes of his tongue and made him cry out again, clutching Tom like his storm anchor.

"Fuck," Bill choked out, as Tom switched to his other nipple and re-created that shattering bolt of pleasure, rolling their hips together and making it so much better that way. His free hand thumbed insistently at the wet nub he'd left behind. His voice quavered "Tom, T-Tom," and his hands snared in Tom's dreadlocks to pull him off, or closer. Bill wasn't sure even if his body had answered for him.

Tom's lip-ring dug into sensitive skin and Bill hissed. Tom raised his head and their eyes met; Tom's questioning, Bill's more than a little desperate.

"Bill?" Tom questioned, tongue flicking out as though gathering the taste of him.

Bill's face was red, he was sure of it; he felt hot all over, not just his face. Tom was on top of him and he felt so good, and he wanted...and he'd been so thoughtful, even exploring himself to make sure of how things worked. He'd been honest when he'd told Bill he wanted to make it good for him. Bill shifted, spread his legs a little beneath Tom and thought about it, let himself want it.

"Maybe," Bill gave in breathily, "maybe we could try it. I-if you're going to be careful." If everything else was as good as what Tom had done so far...well, then it couldn't be bad.

"So careful," Tom promised, bestowing a kiss to Bill's sternum. He sounded eager again, and scooted back further on the bed pressing open-mouthed kisses with a hint of tongue as he went. He finished with a lick to Bill's navel, making him squirm, and reared back to kneel between Bill's spread thighs.

"How do you want to do this?" Bill asked, pleased that his voice remained steady. He looked down the length of his body at Tom kneeling there, hard, wanting him, and another thrill of desire leaped through him, making his cock twitch.

Tom looked distracted for a moment. "Huh? Oh. Well, it's supposed to be easier with you on your hands and knees, but..." He hesitated, tonguing his lip-ring again, not in a nervous way but contemplative.

Bill thought about it and instantly disliked the idea. Being turned away, being put on his hands and knees like that and facing only the headboard, it seemed so disconnected, turning this into an exercise they were going through rather than...

"I want to see your face," Tom said in a sudden rush. "I want you just like this."

Bill drew his knees up and flushed. "Then let's do it like this," he invited. He picked at the blue bedspread, then ran his hands over his own hips and felt how hot the skin was there; he was sweating. Tom had made him this hot.

"Good. Okay. Good," Tom said, crawling up the length of the bed. Bill lolled back as Tom got on top of him again, pressing a kiss to Bill's mouth that was all teeth and a brief hint of tongue, arm going around him and hand latching onto his ass. Bill strained up to meet the kiss but Tom was reaching for something else. He propped himself up over Bill and opened the nightstand beside the bed, getting out a condom and laying it aside, then pulling out a tube of something and breaking through the plastic seal, tearing it off and carelessly flicking the plastic to the floor.

"What's that?" Bill said muzzily, lifting his head and grasping tightly to Tom's arm, the one that was still around him with a hand massaging his ass.

"It's lube," Tom responded in a low voice, one brow raised as he regarded Bill spread out flushed on his bed, on his pillow, breathing hard. "You know, for doing anal."

"Oh God," Bill said, small and mortified. He squeezed his eyes shut.

"Hey," Tom said, dropping the tube onto the bed and returning to him, hovering over him and stroking his face. "Hey, it's okay. Bill? Look at me. I don't want to hurt you. That's why the lube, okay?"

"I know, it's just...it's really gonna...you're going to put your dick in me," Bill said hoarsely.

Tom shifted atop him and it was digging against his _hip_ and that didn't scare Bill, now; it only made his belly tighten more, and made his cock harder than ever.

"If you really don't want to do this..." Tom began, and Bill could tell he was trying not to sound disappointed. His hips inclined away.

"I'm not sure I do," Bill said honestly. He looked up into Tom's dark eyes, registering the anxiety there – and the lust. The brown eyes above him drew him in; made him safe again. It was Tom, and he'd promised to make it good. And Bill had promised not to run away, even though Tom was giving him plenty of chances now. 

He shifted, grunting as his cock made contact with Tom's, making Tom's eyes widen again. "Let's try it anyhow," he suggested, glancing at the condom on the bedspread then away, fixing his gaze on Tom's mouth, traveling lower to his collarbones, his firm sculpted chest and taut abdomen.

"Okay," Tom whispered, and kissed him again.

He shifted until he lay beside Bill again as he reached for the tube and uncapped it, then he directed Bill to bend one leg up toward his chest. Bill did, and wanted to cover his burning face as he exposed himself like that. Tom kissed at his neck and moved upward, kissing the side of his jaw and touching Bill down there, making Bill protest the cold wetness as it circled the pucker of his hole.

"Tom!" Bill whimpered, not happily.

"Sorry," Tom apologized, petting Bill's belly. He stroked over the closed-up bud of Bill's entrance until Bill stopped trembling.

Bill sighed out a breath he didn't remember holding when Tom's finger pushed in at last, slipping in with such ease it could hardly be called an intrusion. It was weird and he was concentrating on it more than his own arousal, even though Tom's fingers were still moving over his belly. Something moved in where Bill was accustomed to movement occurring in the other direction, and it was the weirdness that riveted him, making him forget anything of pain.

"How does it feel?" Tom asked him, low-voiced and husky.

Bill tried to turn his face away but Tom was right beside him, stroking his hip and kissing the side of his face as he pressed his finger all the way in.

"It feels...like a finger in my butt; God, Tom," Bill said, flushing all over. Why did Tom want him to _say_ it?

It pushed further into him, firm and relentless, then Tom's mouth was soft and wet on his ear and his finger curled. Bill gaped in shock and a sound wrenched free of his throat that he barely recognized as his own.

"T-Tom!" Bill gasped, grabbing at his cock, which was so hard it hurt, and so wet at the tip he thought for a moment he was starting to come.

"Good?" Tom murmured against his ear.

"Tom," Bill said again, like a plea. He tried to rock forward, found it didn't hurt, and angled onto Tom's finger. He gasped and stars were emblazoned over the ceiling; over Tom's face when he turned for a desperate kiss.

Tom licked his mouth open and moved the finger back and forth. Bill groaned, then kissed back fervently. He wanted more...something. More kisses, more fingers.

He got both.

Tom stretched him open and he was careful, so careful, as he'd promised. He took his sweet time about it, massaging Bill with his fingers until Bill was the one shoving himself onto Tom and demanding more. He put three fingers into Bill and moved them until Bill was writhing, rocking back and forth on the fingers Tom pushed into him and forgetting entirely that he'd been so incredulous only moments before that anyone would want something up there. 

The prostate was a wonderful thing, Bill decided, doing a complete one-eighty with only the coaxing of Tom's fingers. It was some kind of magic button hard-wired directly into his dick and Tom had become adept at finding it.

"Are you ready?" Tom breathed against his ear.

Bill nodded fiercely and twitched his lips against Tom's when he ducked in for one more kiss.

When Tom moved into position above him, his hand brushed against Bill's face, thumb stroking over his cheekbone again. Their eyes locked. Tom reached for the condom, peeling it open and reaching down, taking care of that carefully as he had everything else. Bill lifted his legs up and kept his eyes on Tom, feeling hot in the face and everywhere else and so wanted, sexy even, as the slick tip of the condom nudged down there against Bill's lube-slick entrance.

Tom looked down at him with such powerful emotion etched on his face that Bill couldn't understand it. Bill had managed to forget, again, that what brought them here wasn't love but Tom's curiosity, his persistence. Tom's hands stroked the backs of Bill's thighs then he leaned into him, pressing the head of his cock into Bill's body.

Bill cried out and tensed as it went in. He couldn't help himself. It was bigger, thicker...it throbbed inside of him and it was making him stretch wider than three fingers. It burned, and Tom was looking down at him with a startling semblance of devotion, so the first smarting pinprick of tears didn't exactly come as a surprise.

"O-ow," Bill whimpered, readily blaming the tears on the pain, which was negligible.

"Hang in there," Tom murmured, looking worried and euphoric at the same time. He pressed in further, bracing himself above Bill on his strong sleekly-muscled arms.

"Oh," Bill responded, his mouth dropping open and his eyes going wide as Tom slithered deeper inside of him. "Ohhh." The long-drawn out exclamation turned into a moan. He was back to his earlier assessment of 'feels weird' but the fact that it was Tom, that Tom was filling him, he was _full of Tom_ made it weirdly intimate instead of weirdly awful and his dick twitched, letting Bill know it was already getting better.

"Okay?" Tom asked him, settling against him all the way, the root of him nestled up into the crack of Bill's butt.

"I...I think so..." Bill heard himself say, and he reached up for Tom's face.

Tom pressed deeper into Bill, rocking his body up the bed as he stretched to kiss him. He began to move, the first shallow pulses, pumping back and forth as though he couldn't hold himself still any longer. He cupped Bill's face with one hand and looked down at him, thrusting slowly, his dark eyes bright.

This time the first hot tear spilling down Bill's cheek was a surprise to him. He bit his lip, horrified when it was followed by another, and another, until tears streamed down his face while Tom moved over and into him. It hurt, yeah, but the pain was mostly in his heart.

It was wonderful but awful; he thought Tom could be the one if he weren't Tom, if he weren't straight, but he was doing it with Tom anyhow because he really did love him, even if this couldn't last. It was utterly hopeless but he was giving his virginity to Tom because he asked for it, because Bill loved him, even if Tom couldn't love him back in that way.

"Don't," Tom scolded him, brushing away tears with his knuckles, rocking into him sweet and slow. "Don't cry."

"It hurts," Bill said, unable to quite stifle a sob. He clutched at Tom's shoulders.

"I'll make it better," Tom promised, quickening the gentle pump of his hips and dragging over something that made Bill cry out and tighten around him, helplessly ecstatic.

Bill closed his eyes as Tom hovered over him, swaying back and forth and trying to make it better with every thrust.

_You can't._

It was because he loved Tom this much, and Tom didn't, that it hurt so much.

Tom pressed him back against his blue bedspread and rolled their bodies together until the burn was gone, and Bill was lifting up avidly into each thrust.

Terrified that he would call out 'I love you' or something similarly self-defeating, Bill latched his teeth onto his lower lip as Tom fucked him ever closer to his orgasm. This wasn't lovemaking, Bill reminded himself, no matter how tenderly Tom stroked his face or hips as he pushed into him and worked his cock in and out. Their bodies moved faster, Tom's balls smacking against his ass as they went at a frenzied pitch and Bill was holding his own, clawing at Tom's exposed shoulders and arms as he raised himself up to meet Tom's ragged strokes. 

This was fucking, and it was amazing, and he could forget for the moment that it would leave his heart hollow.

"Tom," he cried, getting desperate for release. He was so close, but he needed more. That one last little push was missing.

"Come on, Bill," Tom said, leaning over him in a one-armed push up and breathing unevenly against his face. His hand groped between their bellies and wrapped around Bill's cock. His rhythm as he rutted into Bill was sloppy now, but he was clearly working toward Bill's climax and not just screwing him into the mattress.

Bill went rigid and his teeth pierced his lip. He threw his head back and moaned, focused entirely on the hazy enjoyment in Tom's face above him, the way Tom looked utterly wrecked and already satisfied and it was because of him. Knuckles brushed his stomach, Bill thrust into Tom's hand, and a thumb brushed the tip of his dick just right. With a shout Bill clamped down on Tom, his pleasure drawn right out of him in a burst that had him clinging to Tom, raking his abused shoulders again. His cock was spreading wet warmth between their bellies, spurting up and even hitting Tom on the chest and his brown eyes widened but he didn't look disgusted.

Tom propped himself fully over Bill again and looked him full in the face as he thrust harder, faster. He panted, mouth open, a look of total bliss wiping his face clean of any other emotion. "Bill...Bill!"

He slumped over Bill, pressing his lips to Bill's cheek, catching the corner of his mouth as he continued to roll his hips to withdraw then press deep into Bill.

Bill groaned and his eyes fluttered shut. He was almost certain he felt Tom twitching inside of him, though maybe he was imagining things. Whatever was happening, it was good, even though he was spent. He stroked up Tom's arms and thumbed his collarbones as Tom finished, dropping a last kiss onto Bill's mouth, tracing over his lips with his tongue.

Tom laid atop him for a long, exhausted moment until his weight was no longer pleasant; it was grinding Bill's bones under his skin. Before Bill could poke him or otherwise complain, Tom was getting up, leaning back and away and disengaging his softening cock with a careful wince. He rolled off to lay next to Bill and remained there staring at the ceiling, his face blank.

Bill shifted onto his side and tried to figure out what he was feeling, besides freshly deflowered. A little sore, he decided, opening and closing his thighs, surprised at how rubbery he felt. Satisfied, but fatigued. Hungry; he could go for a pizza. He turned his head and looked at Tom's inscrutable profile.

...More than a little heartsick.

He didn't know what he'd been expecting, as he lay there with come cooling on his skin and something - he wasn't up for an inspection - something seeping out of his ass. He lay there as his breath resumed a normal pace and he knew he wanted to be held, but didn't know how to ask for it. They weren't doing this as lovers, after all, but as friends.

Movement at the corner of his eye made him turn his head again. Bill propped himself up on one elbow as Tom sat up, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed. He was going to demand where Tom was going when it became obvious; Tom was disposing of the condom.

Bill groaned and lapsed back onto the bed. One of his hands brushed against the come on his diaphragm and he flinched.

"Bill?" Tom said, sitting beside him, lighting up a cigarette. "Did you... Was it..."

"I thought you quit," Bill interrupted, hitching himself into a more or less seated position - mostly on his left flank - and making a face at the sticky mess of ejaculate on his front.

Wordlessly Tom passed him a tissue from the nightstand.

"Did," Tom mumbled, sticking the filter into his mouth and sucking until the end was cherry red. "This is just..."

 _Bad enough to make you take up smoking again?_ Bill's mind filled in the blank. He shook his head and wiped up the come, then scrambled off the bed and squeezed his eyes shut when that trickling sensation at his rear started up again.

"Where are you-" Tom began, and Bill cut him off with a snappish, "Bathroom."

As he passed the mirror in the bathroom, something caught his eye and he had to stop and stare. He looked...he looked fucking luxuriant; flushed, pliant, thoroughly well done. Bill had to avert his face. He looked sexy, the thought had crossed his mind. But not happy. Bill spent a little quality time with the toilet, wiping until he was satisfied nothing else was coming out, relieved that there was no blood involved. His clothes were still folded on the counter and he pulled on his underwear and pants with a sense of relief. He found his boots and laced them up tight.

It would be bratty to steal away without another word to Tom, however tempting, so he picked up his shirt and went back to the bedroom. His nose wrinkled as he crossed the threshold, _so that's what sex smells like_ , and it wasn't unpleasant, it was actually kinda...it smelled good to him, musky. Like he could do it again.

"You're leaving?" Tom said, looking up at him with unreadable eyes. His gaze flicked over Bill and he reached for the nearest towel, pulling it into his lap to cover his pelvis.

"Yeah," Bill said, all nonchalance. "I have homework, you know."

"Oh," Tom said in a flat voice. He looked up at Bill and exhaled a plume of smoke to one side of his mouth. "I thought we could have dinner together."

Normally Bill would have jumped at this offer, but he'd just been fucked in the ass. Nursing that and his aching heart was about all he thought he could handle that evening. "It's homework and leftovers for me," he said with an apologetic shrug, trying to smile, mostly failing.

"Was it good?" Tom wanted to know. He looked up at Bill steadily. His shoulders were hunched, reddening with welts.

 _'I came, didn't I?'_ Bill wanted to respond, but even he knew it wasn't the same thing. He hummed on a considering note as he sidled up to Tom and plucked the cigarette right out of his fingers. He took a deep drag and watched Tom's face get long and worried. "Maybe," he said with a little laugh, and rubbed one buttock. "Ask me tomorrow and I could tell you for sure." He summoned up a real smile for Tom and handed the cigarette back.

Tom got to his feet with a rueful look. "Want me to walk you home?"

Bill made an exasperated noise in his throat. "What am I, a girl? No, I'll see you tomorrow." Tom took a step forward anyhow, his face intent, and Bill turned hurriedly and shrugged his shirt on.

"Bill," Tom said behind him.

Bill paused at the doorway. He wanted to ask if it was what Tom had expected; if it had been better or worse, looking at his face as he actually came. He kept his mouth shut because no matter what the answer was, it had been a one-time deal.

One-Night Knockout. No one got a second turn.

"Thank you," Bill said softly, instead. The truth was, no matter how much his chest ached he couldn't imagine a better first time. Then he hurried out the door, intent on grabbing his jacket and his bag and clutch before he said something dopey, something he couldn't take back.

"Bill, wait!" Tom said behind him, but he didn't follow when Bill crashed through the living room, scooping up his things and breaking his promise to Tom as he ran.

Did it count as a broken promise, though, when Tom had already gotten what he'd asked for from Bill?


	8. Chapter 8

Bill woke after three failed attempts, though not for lack of trying on the part of his alarm clock. Finally it offered up a blare of loud music that jerked him upright like a twenty-one gun salute to his senses and Bill got out of bed with extreme reluctance, palming the alarm off in passing and heading for his little closet of a bathroom.

He sniffled experimentally, but there weren't any tears in him like he'd worried there might be. It had been _good._ He was melancholy, but the world wasn't going to end.

As he maneuvered his way around the shower, Bill hissed and groaned as sore muscles stretched. He wasn't even particularly sore where he'd thought he would be - _that_ was a mild, tolerable throbbing. It was the backs of his thighs that made him whimper as he shuffled around the bathroom attending to his toiletry, then made his way to the kitchen to stir up some coffee and pour a mug of cereal.

Bill scrubbed at his naked face and stared his phone down. The black oblong was aimed at him like a blind eye from where he kept it plugged in at night. There might be texts. He wanted to check it for notifications.

Instead, he grabbed his coffee and cereal and plunked himself in front of his computer to sort through his e-mails and check his news feeds.

“Ugh,” he said aloud, wrinkling his nose at his customized alerts and looking over the fashion trending for the upcoming season. “Red, silver, and gold for winter _again?_ Come on, give me something to work with.” He'd pick a different signature color, one that would probably be in style next year because he was awesome and psychic like that.

Blue, the thought surfaced. A deep, gem-tone blue.

He saw Tom's face, and squeezed his eyes shut. The precise shade of blue that made up Tom's bedspread came to mind, and brought with it memories of heat and their sweaty bodies moving, and superimposed over it all was that look on Tom's face, the one that had set his features aglow as he came. Tom had _had_ him on that rumpled sapphire blue bedspread.

Maybe not blue after all, Bill reconsidered.

Across the apartment his phone rang out the opening strains of “Mama Said,” and Bill bounded up from his chair, whined, and moderated his pace as he hurried to snatch his phone up and detach the charger. He noticed in passing that it was flashing notifications at him and his heart performed a queer little thrill.

“Hi, Mom!” Bill chirped as he answered.

“Thank God,” his mother said immediately. “My son is still alive. It's been two weeks since our last conversation.”

“No way! It's only been...” Bill protested, wheeling until he found a wall calendar. His face fell. “Oh. Sorry.”

“That's okay, sweetie, it's been busy at work for me,” his mother replied. “How is school?”

“Oh, school is...school's good,” Bill said. He tried to remember something other than what he'd done last night to offer up for conversation.

“What's wrong?” his mother demanded.

“Nothing's...wrong, exactly,” Bill dithered. “How's Dad? Oh, how did your conference go?”

“Don't try to change the subject on me, young man,” his mother said. “Out with it, I can tell you're not your usual peppy self.”

“It's nine-thirty in the morning,” Bill groaned. He dug a heel into one makeup-free eye. “I want to go back to bed, but I have to get ready for class soon.”

“I know, sweetie; that's why I called now. On my break, instead of before I headed off to work. Boy, you are going to love the real world when you get there,” his mother said. She tsked, but it didn't sound entirely unsympathetic.

“This is the real world,” Bill said, rubbing at his butt with a wince. He didn't get why working adults kept making an artificial distinction between life in an academic setting versus being out in the working world. It was as though they thought experiences on campus were less real somehow; less valid.

“I'm sorry, Billy,” his mother replied, sounding somewhat contrite. “You know I meant the post-graduate life. So are you okay? Tell me what's wrong.”

Bill took a breath. His mother had the sixth sense; when he wasn't quite feeling 'on,' she always knew from the first word out of his mouth. She'd only pester him until he admitted to whatever was on his mind.

“I-had-sex-last-night,” Bill blurted in a rush, and scrunched his face up to brace himself.

"Oh, Billy!" she exclaimed excitedly. "Was it...you're not happy about it, are you?" Her voice dropped a register, going from glee to serious in a single sentence.

"No," Bill faltered, then sat down on the edge of his unmade bed with a thump. He winced, one hand going to his tailbone. "Yes. Kind of? It was...good. And I love him, but..."

"You had sex with Tom?" his mother screeched.

"Mom!" Bill exclaimed, holding the phone away from his ear. "Who said it was Tom!?"

The snort answered him loud and clear before any verbal response. "Bill, please. I've been your mother for nineteen years. Unless you found the one, true love of your life between now and the last time you called me..."

"Didn't," Bill said in a small voice.

"...then if you had sex with a guy that you love, it was Tom," his mother concluded.

Bill examined his nails and listened to his mother breathe for a moment. “Fine, it was Tom,” he admitted.

“How, sweetie? Isn't he straight?” his mother pressed. “Oh, shit...Billy, my break is over, I have to get back to work. Call me later, okay?”

“I will!” Bill agreed, though he was less than enthusiastic. That undercurrent of 'later' was shaded with 'tell me everything' and Bill was somewhat ashamed of himself. No, not ashamed. He thought his mother would be disappointed. Would she think he'd caved too easily?

“You'd better call,” his mother said, tone turned threatening. “Have a good day, baby, I love you!”

“Love you too,” Bill said with a sigh, and ended the call. Funny how he became 'baby' again when he confessed he'd ended his nineteen-year streak of virginity.

He sat on the bed a moment longer, then checked his notifications. No missed calls, four texts. One from Andreas – a stupid link he'd probably meant to e-mail rather than text to Bill. Three from the girl friends that still lived in the dorms, assuring Bill that they missed him and wanted to see him soon.

None from Tom.

He tossed his phone aside and flopped back onto the bed with a drawn-out groan. What had he expected; flowers delivered to his doorstep and breakfast in bed? This was a day like any other. He had made a point of telling Tom that he didn't want things to get weird. Tom only texted him when he had something to say, so...this was normal.

This was what he wanted.

Bill tipped his head to the side and glanced at his alarm clock. With a screech he wobbled to his feet and hurried back to the bathroom to finish up his personal grooming routine.

Hair flat-ironed and spiked up a bit then sprayed into place, Bill applied makeup with a restrained hand. He spent too long in front of the steel racks he had lined up against one wall in lieu of a closet, then finally picked something that made him feel sexy over something warm and cable-knit and comforting. He transferred the contents of his clutch to a larger, black ruched handbag, changed his mind and dumped everything into a bright paisley bag that really was too girly not to be called a purse, then dug out his shoulder bag and tossed everything in there along with a pair of tennis shoes in a ziplock bag. If he was going to run, he might need to be prepared.

“Hell,” Bill said aloud, and threw the bare essentials back into the ruched bag. He couldn't figure why he was so indecisive this morning. Usually he woke with a clear-cut vision of how to put himself together for the day.

He excavated his phone from his bed, sniffed at it disapprovingly when he saw there were no new notifications, and tucked it into his handbag as he headed out the door.

The Tuesday-Thursday schedule was different for Bill, as it was for most of his peers. He woke a little later, had less classes, and typically tried to bulldoze his way through a lot of assigned reading and homework as a result of the freer schedule. He and Tom usually had lunch in spite of their different Tuesday-Thursday schedules, because they were both on campus before and after the noon hour. Sometimes Andreas joined them, or some of their female friends.

Music history, the morning class, was a long lecture, and by the end of the hour and a half Bill stumbled into the wan sunlight with relief, stretching his arms above him and not bothering to stifle a yawn. He looked around the broad stone patio reflexively for a head of dark blond and brown dreadlocks, frowning when his visual inspection came up with no results. A part of him had been picturing it, he knew. He'd expected to come out to Tom waiting for him outside the auditorium with his head ducked, looking up at Bill with a grin that lit his face as their eyes met.

"Stupid," Bill mumbled under his breath, and checked his phone again. No texts.

Bill leaned against the sun-warmed stone at the side of the building and shaded his eyes. There'd been not so much as a hint of a word from Tom, so he was assuming nothing was different. Tom had assured him that things wouldn't get weird, after all. Lunch on campus was something that they did, so he planted himself with his arms crossed over his chest and waited.

And waited.

After twenty minutes Bill was pissed, and struggling to cram down the hurt to which he sternly told himself he wasn't entitled. They weren't dating; Tom wasn't his _boyfriend._ If Bill didn't get his ass in gear, he wouldn't have time to fit in lunch before his next class, so he had to be done with waiting and get over himself. He set off across the Quad with a purposeful stride, checking his phone again and starting to answer one of his female friend's texts before turning the screen off with a swipe of his thumb. He didn't want anything to do with the hapless device, today.

Bill's lip curled as he found himself looking around for Tom in the student union, as though their dilemma was as simple as a pair of crossed wires. It wasn't a communication issue. The problem was that Bill was an idiot, and he'd let Tom fuck him. Now nothing would be the same again.

And, god damn it, Bill still _wanted_ him. At last Bill admitted to himself what had been throwing him off balance all morning. He missed Tom. The sex had been great but he wanted to be around Tom, he wanted Tom to want to be with him, and if he'd thrown that over for one night of great sex, he really was more of an idiot than he'd thought.

He lined up to get a caesar salad, frowning up at the salad station menu even though he'd already made his decision. When the hand touched his elbow, he whirled.

Tom stood behind him, raising an arm in a half-defensive pose as though fearing that Bill would hit him.

"Tom! You're here!" Bill stated the obvious, too happy to see him to do anything but dissolve into a pleased grin.

"Sorry I'm late," Tom apologized, tugging at one of of his overly large sleeves. He looked over at Bill through his lashes and furnished up a genuine smile. "I got held up after class." His eyes traveled quickly down Bill from face to boots, then up again, and his smile turned faintly strained.

Bill snorted, imagining the scenario as it usually played out – a pretty girl had flirted, all but climbed into his lap after the bell rang, and asked Tom for his number. Tom would have given her the apartment line – he never gave them his mobile number – then they had probably ended up discussing the various campus date-spots where they could make a night of it, resulting in Tom letting Bill wait unknowing outside the auditorium.

Tom was giving him an odd look and Bill tried to snap out of his bitter projections.

"You okay?" Tom asked him softly.

Bill blinked at him "Okay...?" he echoed.

"Yeah, you know..." Tom's tongue emerged, swiping to one side of his chapped lower lip. "Um, not too sore?"

Bill's eyes widened and a flush of heat returned to his cheeks as though it had never left. He shrugged and turned around to check his place in line, taking a few steps to resume his position in the queue. Tom followed, appearing by his side. "I, it's," Bill began, and his voice cracked. He was reliving a sudden flash of what it had been like for Tom to be _in_ him, moving atop him, and what made him squirm right then wasn't discomfort. "A little. Not too bad."

"Good," Tom said, touching his arm. "Bill, I'm going to get pizza – meet up with me when you've got your lunch?"

"Uh-huh." Bill ducked his head until black bangs obscured his vision.

Tom hesitated a moment longer, his fingers brushing along Bill's sleeve, then he shuffled off. He wasn't wearing track pants, and as usual his low-riding jeans forced him to move in what Bill had always derisively termed a 'duck-waddle;' something he'd found equal parts endearing and ridiculous. This afternoon Bill fixed his gaze on the baggy seat of Tom's jeans and wanted to give the finger to his friend's retreating back. 'Not weird,' his pert ass. Bill's soreness or lack of it was certainly not a conversation that they'd have on any other day.

Then again, Bill supposed it was preferable to pretending that they hadn't done anything at all.

Three places away from the register, Bill decided that he hated vegetables, after all. He went for the fried foods station, ordering up two servings of mozzarella sticks, a helping of pirogies, and oven-cut french fries. In a nod to the recommended daily dose of vitamins, he grabbed a Snapple fruit drink as an afterthought.

"Not where I left you," Tom observed, joining him with a tray. He took a pull of his drink, the liquid rising up acid-green along the straw, and the aroma of the pizza on his tray was so tantalizing that it was making Bill salivate.

"Changed my mind," Bill muttered. He'd been doing that a lot today.

Food procured, they went upstairs to the outside patio. Bill hauled up short as he glared at a trio of girls that had taken over his and Tom's usual table.

"It's all right, let's sit over here," Tom said, nudging his elbow and indicating another table, less exclusive in its positioning. It was right in the middle of the patio, surrounded by other tables. “We got here late; my fault.”

Bill wrinkled his nose, but followed.

Halfway through his first boat of mozzarella sticks, Bill finally gave in. "What kept you after class?" he asked, trying to slip it in with what was probably exaggerated casualness.

"Oh, uh..." Tom winced and rubbed a hand at his nape, looking off down the sunlit expanse of the Quad. He set his mostly-finished pizza back onto his plate.

Bill's heart tripped over an uneasy beat. If Tom was going to tell him he'd picked up another girl's number, he was going to throw up, he really was. Bonus points if he managed to do it all over Tom.

"...I'm not doing so well in Statistics," Tom admitted at last. "The T.A. kept me after class to talk about my performance on all the tests we've had lately."

Bill's brows climbed. That had been the last thing he'd expected to hear. It hadn't even been on his radar. "Really?"

"Yeah, I...kind of suck at math," Tom said with a small grimace. "I had to drop out of Calculus last year, remember? Then I switched majors to avoid math entirely...Dad was so pissed."

"I think you've had shitty teachers," Bill said bluntly. "You're smart, Tom; it's not that you can't do math. You've never had it explained the right way."

"You offering?" Tom said, quirking a brow at him.

There it was. That _flirty_ smile. Bill sucked in a breath. "Well, I've never had Stat, so..."

"I know, I know," Tom said, waving a hand. "This is something I've got to figure out on my own. I don't want to flunk out and have to take it next semester, you know?"

"You won't," Bill said confidently. He was riding a sudden surge of good mood, and didn't want to dig too deeply for the cause. 

"I'll do my best," Tom said with another wince. "Stat is...hell, if I can get through the semester with a C, I'll be thrilled. Maybe even a D, as long as I pass. Whatever. Want to play pool after your last class?"

"Oh..." Bill stalled, caught off-guard. He'd forgotten that Tom had a gap of a few hours between his last and track. "I don't think I can, I..." _Have to go home and beat myself senseless. Beat myself off. Go curl up and die._

“Have homework?” Tom supplied, expressionless.

“Yes,” Bill seized on that gratefully, then registered Tom's studiously neutral look. “It's not a dodge, Tom.” He did have homework, and he had the stack of books in his backpack to prove it, but he didn't think he could handle too much Tom-closeness this afternoon. Funny. When he'd thought Tom was ditching him, it was all he'd wanted.

“Right,” Tom said quickly, fixing his attention on the discarded pizza crust from the slice he'd already downed.

Bill eyed him a moment longer, fretting his bottom lip between his teeth. He sighed and pulled his other boat of mozzarella sticks closer, preparing to devour it.

“Bill?” Tom said after a long moment, when Bill was licking his fingers after a particularly large bite of marinara-smothered cheese. “You said to ask today, so...I'm asking.”

Wide-eyed, Bill paused with a dripping mozzarella stick halfway to his mouth. “Um?”

Tom licked his lips. His dark eyes were less than assured, but he kept them steadily on Bill. “Last night. How was it, for you?”

“Oh. It was, it was...” Bill set his food aside and wiped his hands. He wanted to duck his head, but he was locked into eye contact with Tom. His pulse sped, thrumming at his throat and earbones in a rush that spelled out the heaviness of pleasure, Tom rocking him into the blue of his bedspread, the two of them moving fast and faster as they rushed toward oblivion. It had been the end of something, no matter how enjoyable it had been. Now Tom was giving him that long face again, and Bill had to stop running and give him a real answer. “It was...incredible.” He settled on that word at last, honest but still holding back that little bit of himself to preserve his own safety.

“Yeah? Really?” Tom's eyes widened and his sudden grin was more than relief, it was...happy? “Bill, I--”

“ _Heyoo_ , guys, what's up!? I have been looking _all_ over for you two!” a familiar voice crowed. Andreas deposited himself at one of the empty chairs at their table, dropping his backpack atop it with a thud and setting it to rocking. “The hell have you been?”

Bill tsked as Tom glared over at Andreas with unexpected hostility.

“We both got to the union a bit late today, that's all,” Bill began, grabbing at his Snapple as the table rocked. “Tom's fault, of course...” The bottle slipped out of his grasp, rolled over the edge of the table, and shattered on the stone patio.

“Crap! Sorry!” Andreas yelped.

“Damn it!” Bill cussed as fruit juice splattered his boots. He grabbed a napkin and bent to retrieve the larger pieces.

“Bill, don't – wait for a janitor--” Tom began, getting up from his side of the table.

“Shit!” Bill cried, recoiling as a thick piece sliced into his index finger. “Damn it, Andreas!”

“Hey, _I_ didn't cut you,” Andreas defended himself.

Bill lifted his hand to pop his bleeding finger into his mouth and Tom was there beside him, taking Bill's hand between both his in a gentle but unshakable grip and examining it. “Don't do that,” he chided, bending an intense gaze on Bill's finger. “You could get glass in your mouth; then I'd have to take you to the emergency room.”

“Could take myself,” Bill mumbled, face heating up. What was he, a little kid?

“Sure, but that's not the point.” Tom plucked the napkin from Bill's loosened grasp and wadded it up, pressing it against Bill's finger after a close examination. “Hold this. It's not deep enough to need stitches. Put pressure on it, here.”

Bill nodded dumbly and held the napkin against his finger. It didn't hurt, yet; probably because he hadn't actually seen the cut. He'd barely recognized the first slash of red blooming over his skin. He stayed where he was as Tom went to his backpack and rummaged inside, retrieving a white kit with a red cross blazoned on the cover.

Andreas started to laugh. “Tom, you freak,” he said. “You're so compulsive. I can't believe you actually carry around a first aid kit.”

“Shut up,” Tom shot back, his jaw set. He returned to Bill with a small pad of gauze and a band-aid wrapper. “Of course I'm prepared. I'm the certified first aid respondent for the track team. And it comes in handy for something like this, doesn't it?”

Bill said nothing, and held still as Tom fussed over his bleeding finger. He hissed and looked away as Tom peeled the napkin from his finger with the utmost of care, swabbed it with something that made it begin to sting at last, and bound it up.

“There,” Tom told him. “All done. You okay?”

Bill met his eyes at last, finding a smile for Tom. He was his friend, and he took care of him; that was enough. It had to be. “Yeah, thanks.”

Tom's head tipped to the side. He wasn't exactly frowning, but he was really _looking_ at Bill again. He released Bill's hand and lifted his own, as though he'd touch Bill's cheek. “Bill?”

“Hey, Tom!” Andreas said, his voice cutting across the patio loud and cheerful. “Don't you have a one o'clock halfway across campus?”

Tom jerked away and raised his watch hand, checking the time. “Shit! I have to go.” He hurried to scoop his backpack up, looking over his shoulder at Bill. “I, uh, text me later? Or I will; whatever, I...”

Bill, who had started out with a faint smile, was giving Tom a real grin by the time he stumbled off. “Yeah, later,” he agreed, waving with his bandaged hand.

“Good thing you're in track! Run, Tom!” Andreas called after him.

Tom bent a dirty look over his shoulder, hitched up the seat of his pants with one hand, and began to jog off down the Quad.

Bill laughed and grabbed his own things. “I have to get to my one o'clock, too,” he told Andreas. Fortunately, his was just the next building over. “Can you take our trays to the drop-off?”

Andreas made a face at him.

“Please?” Bill wheedled. "My poor finger, it still hurts."

“Yeah, okay...”

“Thanks!” Bil said brightly, hurrying off before Andreas could change his mind.

His afternoon class was a fun and engaging voice workshop that never failed to keep him engaged. Bill was glad he'd arranged that one into his after-lunch schedule, because it kept him up and moving and he enjoyed belting out the lyrics to some of the bawdy old Irish songs that the teacher seemed fond of. By the time class was over he was grinning, breathless, and not exactly in the mood to coop himself up in the library with piles of dusty books and no companionship.

Bill headed for the Quad, digging his mobile out of his pocket. One missed text from Tom.

_cn i c u l8r? aftr track._

Bill hesitated, thumb hovering over the reply button.

"Bill! Hey, Bill!" someone called off to the side.

Curious, Bill glanced over – he thought he recognized the voice, but he knew a lot of people. Instantly he found himself grinning. "Hey, Georg!" He gave a little wave to the upperclassman.

Georg had set up camp not far from one of the sidewalks that crossed the Quad. He was sprawled out over a large checkered blanket, the alternating checks made up of the gold and blue that comprised their school colors, and there was a stack of books and what appeared to be a brown bag lunch beside him. Georg waved him over.

"You on your way to class, or do you have a minute to sit and enjoy the fresh air?"

"Ohhh, I suppose I have a few moments to spare for someone with hair almost as good as mine," Bill drawled, strolling over and letting his backpack slip down one arm.

Georg smirked at him and swept his shoulder-length, straightened brown hair over one shoulder in a rather ostentatious flip. “Almost? You damn me with faint praise.”

“You must be taking the Shakespeare class,” Bill observed, folding himself onto a corner of blanket across from Georg.

“Yeah, I saved that one for senior year, too. Easy A,” Georg confided with another smirk.

“Smart move,” Bill lauded him. “Then you can coast through your senior year on just your good looks.”

“That was the plan,” Georg said. He grinned over at Bill, waggling an eyebrow. “What, no trap in that one?”

“Too lazy,” Bill admitted, leaning back on one elbow and rummaging in his handbag for his Dior Homme glasses. He shifted on the blanket, contained a groan as his butt gave him a warning throb, and changed position to put his weight on one thigh instead of his ass. “Besides, sometimes I think you set yourself up, and that takes out half the fun.” He winked.

“Given much thought to the Lehardt competition?” Georg asked him, changing the subject with a rueful grin.

“Ugh,” Bill said. “I'm good with lyrics, but I'm crap at coming up with the melody to go along. And I'd have to find an accompanist...it's a lot of work, a real pain.” Fleetingly he thought of Tom, but Tom had made it pretty clear than playing guitar was something he didn't share easily with others.

“So it's not worth doing?” Georg commented. “Because it's not easy, because it's a lot of work?”

“I didn't say that,” Bill protested, irked. He leaned to one side on the blanket, gazing across the Quad. He had to shade his eyes with one hand, even despite the excellent glare-reducing quality of his sunglasses.

“Okay, okay,” Georg said. He made a pacifying gesture. He reached for the crumpled-up brown bag to one side of him. “Snickerdoodle?”

For a moment, Bill thought that Georg was calling him a pet name and he gaped, about to shriek with laughter. When the bag opened, Georg was bringing out cookies and Bill's expression transformed.

“Georg,” Bill crooned, clasping his hands together. “You're my best friend. Those are my second favorite in the whole world!”

“I was going to give you a cookie anyhow,” Georg said with a laugh, offering him two. “Best friendship for the price of a cookie, really? I'd love to see what your favorite gets.”

With a twinge of guilt, Bill thought of Tom as he munched on the cookie. He and Georg both knew that Bill had been joking, but the prospect of selling himself so cheaply gnawed at him for a moment.

“You look sad,” Georg noted after a moment. “More mature, somehow. Did something happen? Something's different...like you're putting out sexy vibes, or something. Nice outfit, by the way.”

“Wh-what!?” Bill sputtered, dropping his cookie. He got crumbs on his artfully-tattered black denim and made disparaging noises. “I, ah...nothing happened! I don't know what you're talking about!”

“Okay,” Georg said, giving him a dubious look. After finishing his cookie, he brightened. “Hey, if you're not doing anything Friday, would you like to join me for a live show, downtown?”

"Oh," Bill said, biting his lip. "Friday is..." Beer and movie night with my friends, he wanted to say, but he was worried all of a sudden that he'd wrecked their night by having sex with Tom. Could he really sit on the couch, thigh to thigh with Tom, replaying that night in his head while he tried to drink until he forgot what it felt like to with Tom that much more intimately.

“Not good,” Georg noted.

Bill blanched. “What? Oh...I mean, not really, no. Friday's not good.”

“You should come see the live, some time,” Georg invited. He gave Bill a friendly grin.

“With you playing?” Bill asked, arching a brow.

“Yeah,” Georg replied.

“Well, maybe I will, some time,” Bill said, lifting his sunglasses to rest high on his forehead and fluttering his eyes in a deliberate flirt. He grinned and handed his phone over to Georg. “I don't seem to have your number, yet.”

As the phone left his fingers, Bill glanced up the Quad and his eyes locked on the distinctive figure of Tom, frozen in place between one step and the next. He was squinting up the Quad in Bill's direction – had he been headed toward him?

Their eyes met. Tom's expression was dark, unreadable. As Bill raised his hand to wave, Tom took a hard right and ambled off, head bent low.

Bill blinked, slipping his glasses back on. What the hell?

His phone buzzed in his hand when Georg handed it back and Bill sighed, unsurprised to find a new text from Tom.

_nvrmnd. hav homewrk._

Bill groaned and palmed his bangs out of his face. What would it accomplish anyhow, going over to Tom's place after track? Tom would shower and be all tempting; they'd play a few rounds of Rock Band, Tom would make his usual joke about jerking off sixty guys and Bill would excuse himself to go off and die of mortification. No. Bill was discovering that things couldn't return to normal, not really, so a few changes were in order.

“Something wrong?” Georg asked him.

Bill gritted his teeth under a bright smile. “Nothing at all,” he denied. _Only everything._ He had to figure out how to fix it somehow.


	9. Chapter 9

It took two days for Bill to make a dent in Tom's stubborn onset of sullen, but by Thursday at lunch the atmosphere between them was back to an even keel, if not exactly normal. The day before, Tom had met him for lunch and even walked Bill to his music composition class after comp lit, but had barely said two words beyond 'hi' and 'bye.' Bill had to find a new normal, and he could tell that Tom was fumbling for how to go about that, as well. By the time that Tom snorted Mountain Dew out of his nose at one of Bill's jokes over the lunch table, Bill was confident that things were going to be all right.

"—and she was banned from the Tri-Delts after that," Bill concluded, tossing his spare napkin at Tom and waving his hands around. "As you can imagine. Poor thing."

Tom made a disparaging noise and mopped at his front. "You don't even _like_ sorority girls," he observed. "Unless that's suddenly turned around in the past few days or so?"

"No way," Bill denied. "They're so bitchy to me, like half of them think I'm going to steal their boyfriends and the other half think I'm some kind of gate crasher. Probably because I dress better than they do."

"It's because you're prettier," Tom mumbled to his plate. He coughed.

"What?" Bill prompted, picking up his napkin and shredding it into bits.

"You're better looking than they are," Tom said, louder, looking up and meeting Bill's eyes for the first time that whole noon hour. "But you know that, don't you?"

Bill waved a hand in dismissal of the compliment. "They usually reserve that kind of catty 'I'll claw your eyes out' treatment for the girls that are a threat to them, Tom, so I'm not exactly happy to hear it, you know?"

Tom laughed. "Yeah, well...sorry if my flattery sucks."

Bill ducked his head and regarded Tom through his lashes. His friend was gazing across the patio, chin propped on folded hands. There were girls in that direction, and Bill wondered which had caught Tom's eye today.

"That guy," Tom said at last.

"Huh?" Bill said, looking in the same direction. There weren't any boys on that side of the patio, and he was confused. "What guy?"

"The one from the other day," Tom supplied, shifting in his seat until he was facing Bill again. "You gave him your number."

Bill sat up straight. "Oh, yeah. You mean Georg from class," he said, ducking his head as he remembered he'd promised Georg his best friendship that afternoon for the price of a cookie. It was nothing to be embarrassed over, nothing serious, but Tom had looked stricken and walked away when he'd seen them, so Bill figured that Tom had been pissed that Bill had turned him down for pool after claiming he had homework.

Tom gave him a troubled look. "Do you...is he...just in your class?"

Bill stared at him blankly.

Tom gave him serious eyes then asked, "Are you and...Georg...are you..."

"Going to see a live show..." Bill filled in the blank, uncertain just what Tom was after.

Tom's brow furrowed. "Like a date," he stated.

Bill stared a micro-second longer, then a snort slipped out. "A date," he said, and burst into wild laughter. "Ha, ha...a date! With Georg. A date!" He pounded the table and slapped his thigh.

Tom narrowed his eyes at Bill. "It's not funny," he said, which made Bill laugh harder just because Tom looked so _irked._

Bill couldn't remember Tom ever having been so concerned over one of his prospective dates before. "Georg is my upperclassman, from music composition," Bill elucidated. "He invited me to see one of his live shows, maybe this weekend."

"Sounds like a date," Tom observed, giving his plate a death glare. He stabbed a fry into his overabundance of ketchup as though it had offended him personally, then smeared red carnage around his plate. 

"It's not a date," Bill said, exasperated. "What's going on with you, Tom?"

Tom lifted his head and fixed Bill with intense dark eyes. He opened his mouth, lowered his chin a little, and pursed his lips. "I...Bill, you and I...we are, I mean, we should...you know, after the other day...we should--"

Bill inhaled sharply, sudden fright kindling a sick burn in his middle. "You said things wouldn't get weird," he said in a small voice. It was useless. Things were already strange, off-kilter, maybe never to resume balance once more.

He knew what Tom felt like _inside_ him, hand brushing against his cheek as he rolled his hips in taut circles and left Bill breathless, and really there was no going back from that.

Tom's mouth elongated and he looked away, breaking off whatever he'd been about to say and flushing.

Bill looked at him curiously, intrigued by the unusual stain of color over Tom's cheeks. Tom didn't blush often, probably because he didn't embarrass easily, unlike Bill. He wanted to ask right then if Tom regretted it, but he didn't dare.

"Are you still..." Tom ducked his head and addressed his plate. "I mean, how are you? Everything...okay?"

Bill almost groaned at the tell-tale heat creeping up his neck. There it was again; might as well plaster a sign across his face that said 'Tom fucked me.' Tom was asking about his soreness again. "Fine, completely fine," he said quickly. It was better than fine; in fact, Bill had tried fingering himself to recapture a little of those incredible sensations, but stopped before he even managed one because ouch, his nails.

Tom's head whipped up and stray dreads bounced around his face. "Completely?"

"Could we...not talk about it?" Bill gritted, shifting uncomfortably as he gazed up the Quad. No one was coming to help bail him out of this conversation; Andreas was at a workshop and Bill's texts to his female friends that morning were still unanswered. He was going to have to bail himself out. "My ass is totally fine and doesn't need to be a topic of conversation, end of story, full stop."

"Sorry," Tom mumbled.

"I should get to class," Bill said. He wiped his hands on the shredded remains of his napkin and tossed it on his empty plate. Even when the rest of his life was crazed and stressful, he never had a problem putting food away – at least that was something, Bill consoled himself. Even if chicken tenders and fries and mozzarella sticks and hush puppies didn't exactly make up for the lack of satisfying a drive that Bill had suddenly discovered with a vengeance.

"I'll walk you," Tom said swiftly, rising from his chair and grabbing Bill's tray. He shifted items from his tray over to Bill's and stacked them.

"Oh," Bill said, taken aback. This wasn't the usual. "Sure? It's right over there..."

"It's on the way for me," Tom claimed, when it really wasn't.

Bill wasn't going to point it out. Tom was talking to him, and that was better than they'd done since Tuesday.

The workshop left Bill breathless and exhilarated, lyrics beating their way through his brain as he joined the shuffle of students going out the door. He opened an e-mail to himself on his phone to capture them. He bumped into someone tall and only looked up when he was grabbed by the shoulders.

"Hey," Tom said.

Bill's face lit up. He couldn't help it; it was like his default setting around Tom. Stupidly happy grin.

Tom began to smile back, and bit his lip. "You want to come over? I've got that CD you were asking about."

"Oh yeah," Bill recalled. As big as Bill's music collection was, Tom had one about twice the size and most of it legitimate CDs, amazingly enough. Bill was looking haphazardly for inspiration for the Lehardt competition, but he was surprised that Tom had remembered that he wanted to borrow it.

"That is, if you're not doing homework," Tom said. He drew himself up and looked as though he regretted saying it, or maybe wanted to say more.

“What about track?” Bill demanded, sensing mischief. Tom was wearing his track pants already, yet clearly had no intention of going to practice.

“Coach is out with the flu, along with half the team,” Tom told him. “So they cancelled again for this afternoon.” One hand rubbed at the back of his neck as he ducked his head, somehow failing to look upset about that.

"I...I'm not sure..." Bill began, a sick sort of anxiety building up in the pit of his stomach. He hadn't been there since...

"What, so you're never going to come over again?" Tom demanded, reaching out to grip Bill's elbow. "Come over. Otherwise that's what's weird."

Bill flushed, because Tom had him, there.

"All right," he gave in. One hand reached up to fix a stranglehold grasp on his backpack strap.

Tom grinned at him widely, a real grin, and gripped at Bill's elbow to tow him up the sidewalk for the bus stop.

Most of the trip had Bill at a loss for words. The most prominent conversational opener that rose to the top of his brain was, 'so, how about the time you fucked me?' because it was rising to the top of his mind, and that wasn't exactly the tone that he was going for, so he kept his mouth shut. After a while Tom asked about his workshop class, Bill responded enthusiastically about the Irish ballad they'd sung, Tom made a remark about dirty limericks, and they were off and running again.

"I don't think I'm going to be able to find an accompanist for the Lehardt competition," Bill mourned, when they had exhausted the conversational gold to be mined from limericks, dirty or otherwise. "I think I waited too late."

"Your a capella voice is strong," Tom observed.

Bill flashed him a reserved smile. "That's flattering, but that's not really how this competition works, you know?"

Tom shrugged. "I didn't think an accompanist was compulsory, but you'd know how it works better than I would. My dad thinks I'd be happier as an accountant or lawyer instead of a guitarist, so..."

"That's bullshit," Bill said immediately. "You should do what makes you happy, Tom, not what he thinks you ought to do."

Tom gave him a wry look. "We've had plenty of screaming fights about it, trust me. It pretty much comes down to him holding tuition and expense money over my head; he's paying for it, so he thinks he's got a say."

Bill began to shake his head. Tom had told him about his dad before, of course, but Bill still had trouble comprehending such a perspective.

"Enough about my dad, he's a conversation killer," Tom decided. "Tell me about your ideas for the Lehardt competition again."

"A whole lot of nothing," Bill said sourly. He had several pulled-out pages from his lyric notebook, but not anything that remotely resembled actual songwriting.

"You'll have something," Tom told him with quiet certainty, and Bill looked at him askance.

When they reached Tom's apartment building, Tom took the stairs three at a time and laughed when Bill complained his boots were too finely tooled to keep up with that pace. He unlocked the door and threw it wide, gesturing for Bill to enter with a flourish.

Bill did, and struggled with his boots in the entryway. He was only staying long enough to borrow the CD, he reminded himself, and opened his mouth to ask Tom to bring it out to him, rather than make any pretense of staying.

His bag hit the floor with a thud as the door clicked shut and Tom's arms went around him from behind. A hot mouth sought out his ear.

"Tom!" Bill yelped, twisting around in his friend's arms. Was he really...

Dark eyes intent, Tom surged forward and fitted his arms around Bill, stumbling them both sideways in the entryway a few steps' worth as he pressed his mouth against Bill's. It was such an intense shock that for a moment Bill let him, lips unmoving beneath Tom's. Were they...but he was...Tom _never..._ Half-formed thoughts fired wildly through Bill's brain and he wanted it, God, he wanted to be under Tom like that again getting pressed back into the blue coverlet, opened up and done so good, but he couldn't just... Tom drew back enough to breathe hotly against Bill's chin then he was moving forward with a soft noise, eyes open and mouth headed for Bill's.

“Wait,” Bill managed to get out as Tom's lips brushed the corner of his mouth again. He palmed Tom's face away. “Wait, stop--”

“You don't want to?” Tom inquired, looking vastly surprised.

“I, I...” Bill hedged, waiting for the familiar heat to rise in his face and finding it had relocated lower. His cock was stirring, his belly coiled tight with expectation. He definitely wanted to, but that wasn't at issue. “I thought it was...I mean, I thought...you were done. I mean, you worked it out and it wasn't what you thought it would be, so..."

"You're right,” Tom interrupted, low-voiced. “It wasn't what I thought it would be.”

Bill bit his lip, staring into Tom's eyes uncertainly. Their noses were almost close enough to touch. He never had asked how it was for Tom. “So...how was it?”

“It was way _better_ than I thought it would be,” Tom informed him. He leaned in, setting his lips against Bill's neck and skimming upward along one tendon.

Bill began to struggle as the underpinnings of all the past few days' assumptions were struck from beneath him. "Wait...Tom, what about the One-Night Knockout?"

“This is different,” Tom said huskily into his ear, then licked at Bill's earlobe. “ _You're_ different. You're...”

Bill sagged against him, his eyes fluttering shut. He was going to let him, he knew it already. Tom's mouth was on him and he wanted him; wanted more. The ravenous fire that had been kindled inside Bill wanted more, too, and he was submitting already, becoming pliant in Tom's arms.

“...a boy,” Tom concluded, and drew back to press another kiss on Bill's lips, tongue flicking over Bill's bottom lip and pressing for entrance.

Bill flinched back. “Thank you for noticing!” he snapped. He stiffened and began to disentangle himself. Or at least, he attempted to; Tom was like an octopus, wound around him and suddenly possessing too many arms for Bill to cope with. "Let me...let me go!"

"No," Tom said, his chin setting in that stubborn line. "Shh...Bill, calm down!"

Bill twisted this way and that, but he couldn't manage to writhe out of Tom's grip; he was too strong. And perhaps there was a fair share of 'don't want to get free' in there, his traitorous inner voice added. "Why?" he whimpered at last, separated from Tom by meager inches.

Tom drew back, one hand settling on Bill's waist, the other stroking gentle fingers up into the hair at his nape. His dark eyes bored into Bill's. “There's...is there still not anyone you like?”

Bill tried to take a step back, instinctively, but he was snared in Tom's arms. “I, uh...” His eyes slid away from Tom's, glancing left into the empty living room, and he stammered out without thinking, “N-no, I...no.” He wet his lips and looked back at Tom.

Tom had assumed his typical confident smirk but it looked somehow pained, more put-on than usual. “Then, what's the problem? Was it...bad?”

“No!” Bill exclaimed at once. “God, no! It was...I told you, didn't I?” _Now_ he flushed, and shoved at Tom's shoulder, hoping he wouldn't make him say it again.

Tom flashed him a grin, dropped his gaze, and tongued his lip-ring. The pads of his fingertips brushed along Bill's nape in a slow caress. “What's the problem?” he repeated. “Don't you want to?”

“Um,” Bill whispered. He tried to pull away, to take a step back in the entryway, and Tom followed. Bill's back pressed against the wall and Tom lined his body up against his, making Bill groan. The scattered thoughts that made up all the reasons this was a bad idea were flying out of his brain like wind-driven leaves.

Tom angled in for a kiss, and Bill let him.

For a long moment there was only the touch of moist lips pressing and rubbing along his own. When the line of Tom's tongue pressed sudden and slick along Bill's lower lip, he gasped and gave Tom entry, and Tom delved inside. He circled the head of Bill's tongue stud with his own tongue, coaxing him until Bill began to kiss back. With an anxious noise, Bill grasped at Tom's shoulders and gave in, hauling Tom closer and tangling with the tongue that was pressing in and wrecking his best intentions.

If he told Tom he didn't want to have sex without love, then it was a lie, another lie heaped on top of what he'd perpetrated already. He knew his voice would break halfway through saying it and he'd probably sob out the whole sordid tale; Tom would freak, and that would be the end of their friendship. If he confessed he _was_ in love, and that was why he didn't want to have sex, Tom would go after him until Bill admitted who it was and it would be the same story all over again. The end of their friendship. Bill was trapped in the lie.

Bill pulled his mouth away and set his hand between them, covering his lips in a childish attempt to shield them.

“I can't, I just can't--” Bill began. Tom was already breaking away, his hands disengaging, but he wasn't stepping back.

Tom was sinking to his knees, cupping Bill through his jeans with one hand steadying himself against Bill's hip.

“Oh shit,” Bill uttered in a very small voice. This, he'd never imagined in his wildest dreams. His hands covered his mouth as nimble fingers drew his zipper down. _Are you really going to..._ His eyes rolled back in his head as his eyes slid shut.

Tom drew him out of his boxers and palmed him. Bill was hard to the point of bursting, his skin painfully tight. He looked down once, as Tom pushed down the foreskin around the head of his dick and put his wet lips to the tip of Bill's cock. A strangled noise left Bill and he squeezed his eyes shut, pressing his hands over his mouth.

"Ahh...ah! Ahhh, Tom!"

It was different from the pleasure that Tom had shown him on Monday; not better, but different. Bill started to push his hips forward instinctively and Tom swallowed around his dick, flattening a hand against one of Bill's hips and keeping him flush with the wall.

The keenest point of pleasure was building up in him fast, too fast, and Bill knew that he was going to come in Tom's mouth if Tom didn't stop soon. The slick wet heat of the mouth around Bill was overwhelming and he was sure he was going to burst.

"Tom...Tom, I'm going to..." It had barely been any time at all and Bill was sure he should be embarrassed about that, but he was too far gone to care. He wanted Tom to keep going, but he wanted him to stop.

Tom pulled off him with a moist noise and Bill looked down with a groan. Tom's lips were glistening, wet; his eyes were dark and fixed on Bill, all for Bill.

"Good?" Tom asked, licking at his lip-ring.

Bill groaned again. "Too good," he breathed.

Tom hooked his fingers into Bill's belt-loops and climbed up his body until he was standing again.

“Come to bed with me,” Tom urged, dipping his tongue at one corner of Bill's mouth, pressing a trembling line of heat over his lower lip.

Bill opened his mouth and sucked Tom's tongue in with a desperate little sob. He grasped at the seat of Tom's jeans, getting a handful of belt buckle and straining him closer. “Okay, yes, okay,” he said against Tom's lips when he was let up for air. "Let's go to bed, fuck, yes; I want to so bad."

Tom grabbed at his hand and dragged Bill after him, not even giving him the chance to shuck his boots off.

Not half a step inside Tom's bedroom, Tom had Bill up against the door and he pressed urgent kisses along his neck and chin as he undid Bill's belt and stripped his pants from him. Bill groaned, reaching for Tom's buckle.

"Off," he said, his voice husky and starved and Tom complied instantly, kicking his shoes and jeans off before running a hand up Bill's shirt and playing his calloused fingers over each rib. It was ticklish and Bill squirmed, but cooperated as Tom got his shirt off.

They stripped as though seeking a record-setting and Bill joined Tom on the bed without a trace of embarrassment this time. He was too turned on and eager for it, knowing what came next and trusting that Tom would make it good, so good for both of them.

"What do you want to..." Bill began, and had his mouth shut up as Tom descended on him once more.

Tom kissed him as he pressed their cocks together, thumbing expertly at the head of Bill's dick and making him moan and crowd closer. They kissed for longer this time; Bill wasn't sure. He couldn't see the alarm clock from his angle so the only measure that he had were his rapid-pattering heartbeats and the pulse that thrummed through Tom wherever he touched him. At last, Tom guided Bill's hand to his cock as they kissed. 'Oh,' Bill thought, and maybe he'd been selfish, so he grabbed at Tom's rigid cock and stroked it with a reverent hand.

They kissed until Bill was gasping from it, losing his air in the need for Tom. He was still moving his hand lazily up and down Tom's cock when Tom rolled for the bedside table.

"Do you want to...I mean, is it okay..." Tom began, and Bill lifted himself up for another kiss. Tom licked over both his lips before pushing his tongue in again for a slow taste.

"Yes," Bill whispered when they were finished with that kiss. "Yeah, I want to feel it again." He was flushed, sweating. He wanted it, and he wasn't scared anymore.

Tom bent over him, pressing a kiss to Bill's chest, grazing briefly over a nipple before he retrieved lube and a condom from the bedside nightstand. Bill eyed it avidly. Without a first orgasm to take the edge off like last time, he was worried that he might cream himself in about five seconds of Tom getting inside him, this time.

“I want to see your dreads down,” Bill said in a low voice. Tom had doffed his cap and beanie when they stripped, but his hair was still pulled back.

Tom arched a brow and gave him a smile more shy than confident, odd to Bill's wondering eyes. He reached up and tugged the tie loose from his hair with careful fingers. "All right," he said, his own voice deep and husky.

Bill's hand lifted, reaching like a curious child to touch without permission. He snatched it back before it could encounter the rough-soft texture of the nearest dreadlock. More than once, Tom had bitched about some girl grabbing at his hair as though she thought she had every right to touch. In fact, the phrase 'I'm not a goddamned pony' had made it into conversation more than once, so often did he complain about girls trying to treat his dreads like reins.

"It's okay, go ahead," Tom said with a little laugh. He grabbed Bill's hand and guided it up to his hair. “Touch them, play with them; grab them, if you want to.”

Wide-eyed, Bill tugged on a lock and dissolved into a grin. "So soft," he marveled, surprised all over again even though he had touched Tom's dreadlocks before.

"Don't be shy," Tom said, tilting his head to the side before swooping in to press a brief kiss over Bill's lips. "Do whatever feels good, okay?"

"Okay," Bill whispered. He reached for Tom's cock, wanting the velvety-hard feel of it in his hand again.

Tom groaned and put his head back. "Though maybe not too much of that," he said, and hissed. "Fuck, Bill."

Bill grinned up at him, stroking his hand up and down. "Thought that was the idea," he said, discovering the notion of being himself in the midst of such intimacy.

"I am going to come if you keep touching me like that," Tom said very seriously. "Forget fucking."

"So I guess I don't get to suck it?" Bill said boldly, inspired by the memory of Tom's lips on him, taking him in for the first time.

Tom's eyes widened and they crossed, Bill was sure his eyes actually _crossed_ , and he thrust himself down against Bill's groin and lowered a hand to his ass. "You can't say something like that," he said, his words strained but understandable. "Or I'll lose it right now, I swear to God."

"No," Bill protested, squirming below him. "No, you've gone this far. You have to do it properly, now."

"Properly involves fingers, first," Tom murmured. He laid beside him and teased a finger against Bill's closed-up little hole.

"Okay. Okay," Bill sighed, stretching back against his pillows. This should be more awkward, he thought; but maybe his awareness of that was overridden by his sheer need to be with Tom, strong enough to surmount common sense and self-preservation, as well.

Tom settled beside him and pressed his mouth on Bill's as he fingered him, taking his time about it again.

"Is that good?" Tom murmured against Bill's lips, pressing his fingers in so deep and searching for his prostate.

"Mmm," Bill moaned, crowding against Tom's thigh and rubbing his cock between their bellies. He was shameless now, and he wanted Tom inside him; he was in Tom's bed, splayed over the dark blue sheets he thought he'd never see again, and they were going to do it. "Now, please, now." _Before you come to your senses,_ the thought occurred.

"Let's try something a little different, okay?" Tom whispered, digging his fingers in and curling them, stroking over that white-hot place inside him that made Bill babble like a loon and promise him anything, whatever he wanted, just get in him and hit that spot with his dick, please.

Tom gave him a slice of Cheshire-smooth grin as he loomed above him, dreadlocks sweeping over his shoulders and tickling Bill's face. Bill eeped and reached up, stroking hair back away from Tom's face, then changing his mind and clenching a handful to tug him down and fit their mouths together once more.

Tom put Bill onto his side and reached for the condom. Today Bill reached for it curiously, petting the latex sheathe once Tom had rolled it down to cover his erection. Tom groaned as Bill's fingers closed around him, thrusting up into his touch, but let him explore for a short while.

"I need to...Bill, I want to," he groaned, and to Bill it sounded for a moment as though Tom had said _I want you_ and his heart gave him a painful, irregular jolt.

"Yes," Bill managed, and meant, _have me,_ and was sure he'd over-committed himself but he had no way to back out now. Pants tossed somewhere that-a-way, shirt crumpled in a heap near the door, and lubed up and ready for the touch of Tom's dick, it was the moment of truth again.

Tom fitted a hand to the curve of Bill's cheekbone as he positioned himself above above him, looking down at him with hazy eyes filled with what Bill knew he couldn't let himself believe to be affection. His thumb swept over Bill's cheekbone once, twice, then he was biting his lip as he moved above Bill and into him.

Bill let his breath out slowly, remembering that the burn would go away fairly quickly. He tried to hold his top leg higher, and Tom reached in and guided his knee up to a point that nearly made Bill squeak protest. He didn't exactly practice yoga.

"Bill, I...Bill..." Tom began, drawing Bill's focus back above him, to Tom's intent, almost strained face. "Ahh...Bill, I--"

"Good?" Bill interrupted, bearing down to tighten himself around Tom without really thinking about the effects of that.

"Oh, fuck," Tom whimpered, and his hips stuttered forward.

Bill yelped and watched Tom thrust into him helplessly. He wasn't exactly crying, this time, but the sudden burn was enough to make him bite his lip hard. Then Tom hit it, by accident it seemed, and Bill moaned and tried to lift himself into it even as Tom held him immobile on his side.

"Bill," Tom said, and seemed to like the way that fit into his mouth because he said it again, and again. "Bill...ahh, Bill..."

"Umm," Bill responded cooperatively, doing his best to rock into Tom's urgent thrusts as he relaxed and the pleasure overtook the pain once more.

Tom held onto Bill's leg and leaned over him, fucking into him with long deep strokes until Bill was all but sobbing from the need to come. Every time he reached for his hard-on, Tom batted his hand away.

When Bill thought that he couldn't take it anymore, so full and aching that he was sure he would cry or beg Tom for his orgasm, Tom pulled out and put Bill on his back, riding a leg up over his shoulder and pushing into him again in one long insistent glide. Bill moaned and cooperated, reaching for Tom's dreadlocks to draw him into another thorough kiss. Tom shifted and hit his prostate, lurching into him and making Bill shudder as he saw a cavalcade of stars, again.

"This is okay, right?" Tom asked, pressing in and in, hovering over him with an anxious look on his face.

"Yes...unh! ...Okay!" Bill assured him, driving his hips up and hooking a leg over Tom's lower back to urge him on; to get him closer, deeper. "Better...mmm...than okay; it's good, it's so good."

"We can keep doing this, we can do this as long as there's no one that you like," Tom groaned. "I want to; I want to keep doing it with you."

Bill was full to bursting, heart and inside of him where they were connected. It sounded like the best idea in the world, but they were fucking and anything out of Tom's mouth sounded awesome right now, so Bill knew he should take it out and examine it later. There was something, there was a reason why that was a bad idea. Right now, though, he couldn't think of anything better.

Instead of saying anything he tossed his head and bit his lip, hard, to keep from crying out as Tom rocked him ruthlessly against the coverlet and dragged him ever closer to his climax.

"Don't," Tom said, quickening his movements. "Don't keep it in, I want to hear you. Bill." His voice broke in half over Bill's name.

"Tom," Bill moaned his response, then louder, longer: "Tom, Tom!" He screamed himself raw as he came.

He was barely aware of Tom swearing, the ragged cadence of his hips slowing as he stilled against Bill. The next thing that registered was Tom's hand stroking sweaty hair away from his face, and Tom's lips on his cheek and the corner of his mouth. He was conscious of Tom saying his name more than once, but Bill heard it through a fog as though Tom were very far away.

He sank into sleep, whimpering as Tom disengaged, but content as the strength of wiry arms surrounded him not long after. Tom was whispering something against his hair and Bill tried to mumble something back, but he hadn't quite caught all the words. It was important, but it slipped away as he lost the thread of consciousness. He figured he'd remember it later, surely he would.

When Bill sat up with a start, he was pinioned by an arm around his hips and the room was dressed up in shadows and an overlay of heathery twilight.

He inhaled sharply, swiveling in bed to look down at Tom's sleeping face. There was a look of utter peace on his handsome slack features as he lay snug on the pillow he'd been sharing with Bill. As Bill stroked a few stray dreadlocks back from Tom's face, his chest drew tight with a sensation more painful than exquisite. This was wrong; this was breaking his heart. Tom said that they could keep doing it, but even though Bill was getting something that he wanted, it wasn't everything.

It couldn't last.

“Why are you doing this to me?” he whispered softly, oh so softly, so as not to wake up his friend. Lover. No, not that much; that was Bill being greedy.. Could they even be called friends with benefits?

What kind of a benefit left Bill with nothing to show for what they did but a broken heart?


	10. Chapter 10

"I guess we're playing phone tag again," Bill told his phone, wobbling as he held it against his ear, balanced a tray on his other arm, and strove to shove the door open with his hip. A strong, fine-fingered hand reached out and grasped the door handle, then a sneaker wedged the door open for his passage. "So, um, you're it! Call me back." Bill thumbed his end call button and dropped the device into the handbag tangled around his wrist, giving his rescuer a grateful smile.

"Your mom, again?" Tom asked nonchalantly, holding the door open until Bill was through.

"Yeah," Bill said, hunching his shoulders under the weight of being a bad son. He wasn't so much playing phone tag as he was deliberately calling back when he knew his mother was likely to be otherwise occupied.

She knew he'd slept with Tom, after all. She'd ferret out the fact that he was still sleeping with Tom in a heartbeat, and then dissect Bill's flayed emotions and hasty rationalizations until he didn't know what to think anymore.

The one certainty that Bill had clung to was that sleeping with Tom was a bad idea, bad for him, and yet he couldn't seem to stop doing it. When Tom gave him the heavy-lidded gaze and slowly-unfurling smile Bill was now conditioned to recognize as the 'sex look,' Bill's resistance crumbled and the next thing he knew, he was flat on his back. Or on his knees with his ass raised in the air. Or on his side. Or struggling to breathe through desperate arousal as Tom bent him over the kitchen table...Bill palmed hair away from his face and tried to get a grip on his out-of-control recollections.

After last Thursday, he'd been to Tom's again on Sunday. Andreas had been at work for a long stretch of time and Tom had kept him over with the ploy of having pizza and doing homework, but that had been a trap. They'd showered and done it again. Then, Tom had invited him over yesterday, not taking 'no' for an answer. Each time, Tom asked him if he wanted to try something new even if it was only a slight variation on what they'd done before. 

Bill was starting to think that once they had run out of positions, Tom's curiosity would have run its course. It was an abysmal thought, but the realism kept him grounded.

Tom preceded him to their table on the patio, settling down with an expectant look.

"What?" Bill said, damping down the urge to look over his shoulder. Tom was looking directly in his eyes, after all; he wasn't scrutinizing anything beyond. "Is there something on my face?"

"Not yet," Tom said with a low laugh, bending his head and sinking a chicken tender into his ranch sauce.

"Fuck off," Bill responded, hot enough that he was sure he was beet red. Unlike before, when that kind of comment would simply get Bill flustered – after taking him a full minute to get the innuendo – now it sent a disconcerting jolt to his groin.

Bill hated it; he wore tight jeans as a rule, and he hadn't popped public boners like this even when he'd been going through puberty.

They hadn't done that yet – Tom coming on Bill's face. In a way, that had been how their strange game had started: Tom thinking about Bill's face while he came. According to Tom and Andreas, anyhow. Bill hadn't even sucked Tom's dick, and Tom hadn't asked or made any gestures subtle or blatant to indicate that was something he wanted.

Tom had done that for Bill, though. More than once; usually while fingering him. He did it without comment; Bill couldn't really tell if he enjoyed it or found it inoffensive, and he had wondered about reciprocation but was unsure whether he should ask or go for it. They'd had sex, but they didn't really talk about it so Bill was uncertain about a lot of things.

All he knew was that Tom wanted him that way until Bill found someone that he liked, and Bill was pretty sure that he wanted Tom forever. So where did that leave them?

"Look at all of that healthy stuff on your plate," Tom said, poking at Bill's hand with a breadstick and bringing Bill out of his introspection.

With a start, Bill looked at his garden salad and the side of vegetable-rice soup. "Right, well. Man can't live on pizza alone," he said, ruffling a hand through the ends of his hair. He ducked his head as warmth chased through his cheeks. Beer and pizza night with his best friends this past Friday had been agonizing, to say the least. Tom had kept crowding closer and closer to him on the couch, so Bill had complained of cold, thinking that he could huddle under his own little blanket like a shield. Instead, Tom had taken a huge blanket and dropped it over both of them, and had rubbed and petted Bill's thigh for so long that he'd been worried he was about to get a hand job.

Andreas hadn't noticed anything, slamming back beers and admiring Scarlett Johannsen's tits, but Bill had been nervous the whole time.

"How are you feeling?" Tom asked him, making Bill glance up quickly mid-bite.

Bill held up one manicured finger as he chewed and swallowed. "Wh-what do you mean?" he asked. Please let it not be soreness, he sent up the fervent thought. Tom seemed to wait a couple of days in between asking him to come over after school, so Bill knew that he was trying to be considerate about that.

"You've been really quiet lately," Tom told him.

"I, I have?" Bill faltered. How was he supposed to act the same as before? He summoned up a smile for Tom. "Everything's fine. Better than fine."

Perfect. Devastating.

"Really?" Tom pressed. He reached up to toy with a raggedy dreadlock that was in need of some tightening, leaning one elbow on the table.

"Yes," Bill said firmly. It was his issue to deal with. He was the one who couldn't tell Tom 'no,' after all; not so long as Tom wanted something from him. The fact that Bill wasn't getting everything he wanted...well, that was his own heartache.

"I want to ask you something," Tom said, lowering his dark eyes and speaking more to his lunch tray than to Bill.

"Shoot," Bill invited, but he was uneasy.

"Bill, do you think you could--"

Something hit Bill in the back of the head and he turned with a vicious frown, one hand going up to his hair. Andreas waved from halfway across the patio.

"What the hell did you throw, you jackass!?" Bill demanded. He continued to explore his hair, worried that something had stuck but not finding anything.

"Bread roll," Andreas replied nonchalantly. "It bounced. Wow, you look great today, Bill!"

Bill blinked, then preened. He ran a hand up the back of his hair to check for disorder. "Thanks. I guess I'll forgive you...this time." He turned back to Tom, who was now trying to kill Andreas with his mind, as near as he could tell. The flattened, down-turned mouth and sharply slanting brows over narrowed eyes were good indicators. "Tom? You wanted to ask me--"

Tom waved him off, aiming an annoyed glance at his plate. "Later. Later, okay?"

"Okay," Bill echoed, giving him big eyes, unable to shake the sense that he'd done something wrong. "Andi? What's up?"

"The usual; haven't done the reading," Andreas said, seating himself on the side between Tom and Bill, facing the Quad. "I was at work last night; had another closing shift."

Bill bit his lip before he could say 'I know,' because he'd been over at Tom and Andreas's last night. Tom had been on him the minute Bill had turned from the fridge with a Coke in his hand, and they hadn't even made it out of the kitchen. He'd wanted to ask when Tom had started carrying lube and a condom in his pocket before deciding he didn't want to know, in case it wasn't for him.

"So can you guys fill me in on the reading, in case the prof calls on me...?" Andreas trailed off hopefully.

Bill was no longer paying attention to Andreas; Tom's gaze had gone past Bill's shoulder, and Bill glanced around to check that it really wasn't him this time.

Across the patio, a group of girls was clustered at one of the larger tables. Bill's stomach lurched as he recognized pretty brunette Ariel, with her pixie-cropped hair and wide-lipped smile. She was gesturing to Tom, and Tom was frowning in her direction.

Ariel made a more insistent 'come-on' gesture, half-rising and bracing one hand against the table. The move dipped her chest forward and she exposed a generous view of the rounded tops of her creamy-skinned breasts.

"Whoa, Tom," Andreas said. "Looks like she's gonna come over."

Indeed it did. She got up from her seat, beginning to cross the patio flagstones in her sunflower and jewel-adorned platform thong sandals. Bill frowned at those; they were very high school, extremely two years ago.

With a muttered curse, Tom pushed back from the table and rose. "Be right back," he said.

Even though Tom had put on an attitude of annoyance, Bill was twanging with anxiety as Tom got up and went toward Ariel. He couldn't get where this sudden rush of nerves was coming from – Tom didn't do girls more than once; he and Bill didn't have any commitments between them and they certainly weren't dating; and Bill didn't have a say over who Tom did or didn't speak with no matter how it made him feel in any case. He twisted his fingers together and gave that up in the next moment in favor of pushing his salad around his plate, trying to figure the best lettuce positioning to make it appear as though he'd attempted to eat it.

"You know," Andreas said, "you should be careful; you're looking jealous."

"Bu...buh, what? Jealous? Don't be stupid, I'm not jealous of her," Bill sputtered.

Andreas snickered. "Bill, you idiot. I meant him – you don't want Tom's sloppy seconds, after all."

"That's disgusting," Bill said immediately. It sickened him for more than what Andreas was thinking, of course.

"My point," Andreas said. He was looking in their direction, making Bill wish he had a better angle or at least was willing to let his curiosity override his dignity in order to twist around and see what was going on, too.

"What did you say about the reading?" Bill asked, hoping to change the subject.

"Holy shit," Andreas said, widening his eyes.

"What? What is it?" Bill demanded. He stabbed at his plate and punctured styrofoam.

"Uh, she got out a planner," Andreas said. He set his chin on his hand and watched intently. "Oh, I am going to give him so much shit for setting up another date with her..."

"I thought Tom already got what he wanted from her," Bill said, shocked. He was numb, unwilling to turn around and see the confirmation with his own two eyes. If Tom was making dates with Ariel after he'd already been with her...maybe the One-Night Knockout was a thing of the past, and sleeping with Bill had convinced Tom to make a go of it with one girl, after all.

"I know, right? Whatever happened to One-Night Knockout Kaulitz," Andreas said with wonder. "Hey, you want to play some pool and grab a pizza after your last class?" 

"No, I've...I've got homework." Bill slouched over his wilting salad and stirred it around without enthusiasm.

When Tom returned to the table, Bill didn't look up. He'd moved on to spooning through his cooling vegetable-rice soup, trying to figure why he hadn't gone for the chicken tenders. It was as though, in avoiding his mother's calls, he'd been trying to be conscientious in another way but it was useless in the end. Bill was pretty bad at making himself do what was good for him.

"Is anyone going to tell me about the reading?" Andreas said, throwing his hands up in the air.

"Didn't read it," Tom said, the words ground out from between clenched teeth.

Startled, Bill glanced over at him. Tom's shoulders were stiff, and his expression was rigid, furious.

"What's up with that?" Bill said, indicating the other side of the patio with a wave. He did a shoulder-check to see if the brunette was still there, or if she'd moved on. Ariel was still looking their way and when her eyes met Bill's, she gave him a smile that was neither pretty nor nice. Bill turned in his chair to face the Quad, annoyed.

Tom had already tapped that, but there was no guarantee now that he wouldn't go back. He'd done Bill more than once, after all. In fact...Bill began counting in his head.

"Nothing," Tom muttered. "She's being a bitch, that's all."

Bill bit his tongue to prevent saying something about the girls Tom fucked, because it would be lining himself up for an easy shot at how he ranked in that queue now. He wasn't a girl, but Tom was still playing him.

"So that wasn't you making another date with her?" Andreas pressed him.

"Drop it," Tom said, his face closed-off and red. He set his clenched fists on the table. His nostrils were flaring.

Bill couldn't help but stare. He was trying to recall the last time he'd seen Tom so angry; then the memory surfaced with a vivid flourish. Tom had gone off on two frat boys at a party for calling Bill a fag and describing what should be done to him in such lurid detail that Bill had wanted to plant his boot-heels in both their asses and ask how they liked it. He'd wanted to leave; Tom had gotten all four of them kicked out.

"Tom," Bill said, and took a breath.

"Later," Tom said. He grimaced, then shook his head a little and tipped his head back, taking a deep breath. "Want to tell us about the reading we were supposed to do today, Bill?"

Bill inhaled. Tom's expression was still furious enough that he didn't want to press his luck. He examined his nails in lieu of examining his friend's face for further clues. "Yeah, whatever. Slackers."

"I was a little too busy last night for reading," Tom said with a low laugh.

Bill jerked his head up.

"Oh?" Andreas said with interest. "Hot date last night?"

Bill widened his eyes anxiously at Tom. He was scared stiff, too nervous to even shape the word 'don't' with his mouth, and Tom was looking straight at him.

"The hottest," Tom answered hoarsely, flicking at his lip ring with a wet tongue.

Bill lowered his head until bangs and hair veiled his burning face, but he was smiling.

"Yeah, you always bring the hot ones over when I'm not around," Andreas continued, and Bill lost his smile.

It was a good reminder, he told himself. Tom had been through a veritable procession of hot girls, and he could go right back to that without a moment's notice. Girls wanted him; they went out of their way to approach him, as Ariel had proved today.

"Andreas..." Tom began, sounding annoyed. He pushed upright, scraping his chair back with a loud noise. "Bill, you finished eating?"

"Hey," Andreas protested, and began to cram his sandwich down in a couple of large bites. "Hey, it's not time to go yet."

"Well, I'm going," Tom said, hiking his backpack high on his shoulder. At Bill's nod, he shifted his empty plates and fast food boats over to Bill's tray and stacked them together.

"W-wait! What the hell!?" Andreas sputtered. "Did I say something? You guys!" He made a frantic effort to shove more sandwich into his mouth, choked, and watched with huge eyes as Tom swaggered off with Bill trailing in his wake.

"What was _that_ about?" Bill asked, catching up to walk abreast with Tom in a few long strides.

"Pissed me off," Tom grunted. He shoved their trays at the return slot and headed for the Quad.

"You know we have, like, twenty minutes before comp lit starts, right?" Bill queried.

Tom flashed him a sidelong grin, so close to the 'sex look' that it all but riveted Bill to the sidewalk. "So?" Tom prompted.

"Uh, I..." Bill ran a hand through his hair and checked to see if Andreas was catching up to them.

Shit. On his own again.

"You can fill me in on the reading," Tom concluded, an impish spark entering his expression.

"Oh!" Bill exclaimed, flailing out and smacking Tom. "You're a dick. What makes you think I got it done, either?"

"Well, you left to do homework, after," Tom started, levering a raised brow at him. "So I presume that you...did some?"

Bill grinned and ducked his head. "Yeah, yeah. Unlike others that shall go unnamed, I'm conscientious about my grades."

"And your parents promised you something from the Gaulthier spring collection if you make Dean's list," Tom observed.

Bill tipped his nose at a haughty angle. "So you remembered. It's a nice incentive," he admitted. "Not the only reason, of course. I need to be top of my class if I'm going to make something of myself as a post-grad, being a music major and all."

"Wouldn't a trip to Fort Lauderdale for spring break be better than something you'll only wear for about six to eight months?" Tom asked him. He shuffled alongside Bill and shoved his hands in his low-riding pockets.

"Well..." Bill began dubiously, then caught Tom's expression. "Wait, are you asking _me_...I mean, are _you_ going...I, uh...what?"

"Nothing," Tom said, ducking his head quickly. He eyed up the sidewalk as they walked along the Quad.

"Was that what you were going to ask me, earlier?" Bill wanted to know. "You said you'd ask later."

Tom's head lifted, dreads bunching and bobbing at his nape. "Nah. I, uh...I wanted to know..." One hand came up out of his pocket and caught at a dangling dreadlock, turning it round and round. "I, I wanted to ask you if you...wanted to play pool with me after track today."

Bill blinked. That had been an awful lot of build-up, and unaccountably he was let down. "I, ah, sure," he agreed, blithely ignoring the fact that he'd turned Andreas down for the same. This was Tom, after all.

Tom swallowed, nodded; didn't seem any less unsettled. "Good."

Bill echoed the nod, trying to dispel an oncoming frown. He wanted to ask again about Ariel, but he didn't quite dare. What it came down to, he knew, was that he didn't have the right to inquire.

Instead, he poked Tom in the ribs and ran forward a few steps, evading Tom's attempt at retaliation.

"Brat!" Tom exclaimed, making a lunge and tripping over his sneakers, evidently forgetting his denim encumbrance.

"You can't catch me; I am a gazelle compared to your awkward moves!" Bill claimed. He laughed and pranced sideways as Tom waddled toward him with determination anyhow. Tom's choice of baggy jeans made him a too-easy target. Bill eluded him again, then pivoted to walk backwards along the sidewalk, facing Tom. "In heeled boots, even!"

"Yeah, yeah," Tom grumbled. "Bratty gazelle."

"Okay, you know we were supposed to read 'The Importance of Being Earnest' for today's class, right?" Bill prompted him.

"You are full of lies!" Tom said at once, levelling a finger at him. "Lies, Bill. That was _last_ week. I did the reading, then."

Bill laughed at the exaggerated indignation on Tom's face. He checked over his shoulder to make sure that the sidewalk was still clear. He was pretty sure that Tom wouldn't let him fall in any case. "You're right; I was testing you, only testing. Today is T.S. Eliot."

Tom scrunched his face up. "So let's get to it."

They loitered outside the auditorium where comp lit was held and smoked while Bill described the reading until Andreas joined them at last.

"Oh, I see what's going on," Andreas proclaimed loudly.

Bill startled and got up from his resting place against sun-warmed brick where he'd been snugged perilously close to Tom. "Uh, what?" He sidled a couple of steps toward the door, cursing himself out because he couldn't even figure whether what they'd been doing had been suspicious. Where was the line, anymore?

"Catching up without me," Andreas said, pulling a pout-scowl hybrid on them.

Tom waved a hand at him. "So get your own Bill."

"Like he's yours, exclusive," Andreas retorted, brushing past both of them and making for the entryway.

It was a stab to the chest and Bill turned from Tom, glad that Andreas's back was to him. He didn't want either of his friends to see how close to home that had hit.

The comp lit class passed in a fog and Bill took notes that were more a variant of auto-writing than the product of his conscious mind. Tom nudged his elbow near the end of class and Bill's gaze flashed up. He clapped a hand to the doodles that had manifested on every available space on his notepaper.

"'Until human voices wake us, and we drown?'" Tom read aloud from Bill's scribblings. "You know we're not even covering that in this class, right?"

"I...I know," Bill replied, unaccountably flustered.

He didn't ask if Tom was going to walk him to class, and Tom didn't offer; he just did. As usual, Andreas scarpered off to work. Tom smoked again on the way to Bill's class and gave him many sidelong glances but said very little. It gave Bill a sense of regression.

Bill wanted to ask what they were doing, but maybe it was more Fight Club than love game; the first two rules being that they didn't talk about it, or it wouldn't happen. Instead of trying to open his mouth, he did his best to intercept all of those sidelong glances, and received only the sting of disappointment when Tom looked away each time their eyes locked. So Bill was no good communicating that way, either.

"See you later," Tom mumbled when they reached the music building, but he wasn't even looking at Bill now.

How could he believe he'd see him later, for sure?

"Yeah," Bill said instead, and kicked through a speed bump of pumpkin-orange leaves to get to the building's stone staircase. He watched Tom's receding back and wondered at what Tom hadn't said. He was sure, completely sure, that Tom hadn't intended to ask him whether Bill would play pool with him that evening.

Andreas was working again. Maybe Tom wanted him over for sex again.

Bill sighed, nodded to himself, and sought out the elevator. He smiled at an incoming classmate, shrugging when the gesture was ignored.

"Don't you look fantastic," Georg commented when Bill dropped into the seat beside him with an ungraceful thud and a mumbled curse.

"Do I?" Bill wondered aloud, suspecting Georg of sarcasm.

"Uh, yeah," Georg affirmed, now giving Bill the look that implied he had either dropped about fifty IQ points or suffered a blow to the head. "Are you dating someone right now?"

Bill widened his eyes at Georg. "Georg..."

Georg held up both hands. "I'm asking because you've been looking really...uh...you look...how do I say this without putting my foot in my mouth?"

Bill raised a brow at him. "I'm going to assume that was rhetorical because you're already gnawing on it," he informed him.

"Right," Georg muttered, but the little smirk told Bill that he wasn't all that repentant. "So..."

"I look like I've been getting laid," Bill said flatly.

Georg leaned back in his chair and glanced away from Bill, out the window. "A little," he managed, sounding as though he were choking. "Out of curiosity..."

"I'm not dating anyone right now," Bill answered the unspoken question, rummaging through his little bag and fumbling for his phone as it blurted out the notes of his notification, an opening riff to one of his favorite songs. "I'm...it's complicated."

Georg cocked a brow at him but let that pass unchallenged as Bill checked his texts.

One from a dorm girlfriend, apologizing for her late reply and inviting him to lunch the next day. Another, more recent one from Tom.

_meet me at pool aftr track, y?_

_ya, c u,_ Bill typed back, and sent it. He silenced his phone and dropped it back into his bag.

"What?" he snapped at Georg, catching the upperclassman mid-smirk.

Georg raised his hands defensively again. "Nothing, Bill. Did I say anything?"

"You were thinking something," Bill said, sour. He was pretty sure he didn't need Georg speculating about his love life, either. Thank all major religious gods and minor deities that Andreas was so unperceptive. Now, if he could keep avoiding his mother...

...for how long? Bill groaned softly and rested his forehead against clasped hands. That was really what it came down to, his circular thoughts treading the same path and arriving at a conclusion that hadn't changed. How long could he keep this up with Tom?

After musical composition class, Bill holed himself up in the library down the street and submerged himself in his iPod and slate of assignments. He thumbed past the love songs and woeful ballads when he found himself paying attention to those lyrics to the detriment of his schoolwork, and played through the ones with more cheerful, upbeat rhythm.

He headed for the pizza joint, a campus favorite that had a pool table that was much in demand over the weekends, but usually uncontested on a day like Wednesday. As he pushed through the door, he was greeted by more than the cheery bell above the threshold.

"Hey, there! Bill!"

Bill looked up as he walked into the restaurant, searching automatically for the nearness of a familiar voice.

Georg straightened from a precarious lean over the pool table, sweeping his hair over his shoulder with one hand as he balanced a pool cue in the other.

"Oh! Georg." Bill waved at him, looking curiously at another older teen, presumably a senior the same as Georg but shorter, with blocky dark glasses and short-cropped blond hair. "And..."

"This is Gustav," Georg introduced him. "We play pool here sometimes before heading over for a gig, or like now, when we're bored. He's not a major like us, but he plays drums."

"Nice to meet you," Bill said. He gave the pizza hall a quick once-over, didn't see Tom, and approached the restaurant's sole pool table, which had a game in the early stages from the looks of it.

Gustav nodded and returned the same greeting in a quiet tone, then bent his attention to his pool cue.

Georg grinned at Bill and twirled his cue with a flourish, then bent over the table once more.

"Didn't know you played," Bill said, butting his hip against Georg's table and spoiling his shot. "Oops!" The table jostled and the white ball bounced hard off the three, sending both into the pocket.

Georg stood and approached Bill, cue held taut in both hands. "Oh, you have to pay the toll now, Bill," he told him ominously.

"Eep?" Bill ventured. He contemplated backing up a step as Georg closed in on him.

The front door jangled, making Bill look round to do a Tom-check, once again.

Tom strode through the door, met Bill's eyes with a smile, then looked beyond him. His eyes narrowed and he made a beeline for the pool table and, considering he was still in track pants, he moved _fast_. He positioned himself between the table and Bill, looming beside him close enough that Bill could feel the heat of Tom's thigh through Tom's track pants and his own jeans. Tom's hand was near enough to Bill's ass that a hair might fit between them, or perhaps two. ...Probably not two.

"This is my friend, Tom," Bill introduced him, giving Tom an edgy glance. "Tom, this is Georg."

"Right," Tom said quietly, not extending a hand.

"Bill's friend?" Georg said, quirking a brow.

"That's right," Bill said, looking back and forth between them. Was he missing something? The air was charged. Tom looked pissed, from what Bill could see where he was almost glued to Tom's side, and Georg looked hugely amused.

"Nice to meet you," Georg said pleasantly enough. "And this is Gustav, or Gus."

Tom and Gustav grunted.

"Well, they've got the table," Tom muttered, turning to him. "Want to get something to eat? I'll buy."

"Uh..." Bill dithered. If they waited for Georg and Gustav to finish their game, he and Tom would be here forever.

"Play with us," Georg invited. "Bill, here, sent the cue ball into the pocket so I'm more than happy to start our game over."

"That's all right," Tom said. He set a hand to Bill's shoulder blade, giving him subtle pressure to guide him for the front of the restaurant and the bar for placing orders and retrieving pick-up.

"Thanks," Bill said quickly, raising a hand to wave at Georg and his friend.

Georg lifted his first two fingers and raised them to his brow in a brief, jaunty salute, giving Bill a smirk that was far too knowing for Bill's comfort. Gustav simply lifted his chin and turned back to examine the table green.

Tom's hand remained a warm weight on Bill's back until they reached the front of the restaurant.

"What—" Bill huffed, simultaneous to Tom's "Bill, what...?"

Bill shrugged at him and blew bangs out of his eyes.

"What do you want to order?" Tom asked him innocently.

After a slow blink, Bill decided to let it go. The way Georg had been smirking hadn't exactly helped matters. "Double whatever you're having," he said, because it was what they did most of the time. Andreas was the picky eater.

Tom nodded and placed the order for a large meat lover's delight, then added "to go" at the end.

"Wait, what?" Bill protested, even though he'd been thinking not too long ago that he didn't have time to stay for the length of Georg's game in addition to his own and Tom's. "I thought we were going to play!"

"Come home with me tonight," Tom told him, leaning against Bill and trapping him against the wood of the bar.

"I came over last night," Bill protested.

"I don't care," Tom said earnestly. "Do you care?"

"Yeah, I do!" Bill said, rousing up some indignation. "For one, I've got homework, and for another, I'm...it's..." He flushed and looked down at his boot toes, lined up between Tom's sneakers.

"Sore?" Tom filled in worriedly, setting a hand to Bill's hip and fingering his belt-loop.

Bill rolled his eyes and looked away.

"We can do other stuff," Tom said in an under-tone. "Not just...you know."

Bill shifted, rubbed one hand impatiently against his hot face, and looked in the other direction. He knew he should go home and dig into his mountain of assignments, but he didn't want to say no to Tom, either. He didn't want to be used for sex, but it was so good when they did it.

"Okay, but I can't stay late," he surrendered.

"Just come, and that's all I can ask," Tom told him with very earnest brown eyes. Then spoiled it with a snicker.

"Ugh, Tom. You deserve to be smacked for that," Bill informed him.

"You'll like it," Tom said confidently.

"Yeah, we'll see about that." He could say it, but Bill was pretty confident about liking it, too. 

Though not much of anything else at all.


	11. Chapter 11

Bill eyed his cell phone as though it were a snake poised to devour him. The snippet of "Mama Said" began to repeat on its loop, blaring louder on the second go-round, when the first had been more than enough to wake him from his sound sleep. "Time to face the music, or funeral dirge," he said aloud, thumbed the green answer call button, and held the device a healthy distance from his ear.

"WILLIAM JARETH TRUMPER," his mother shouted in the general direction of his eardrum. "YOU HAVE BEEN AVOIDING ME FOR WEEKS; NOW WILL YOU COP TO WHAT'S GOING ON!?" She was loud enough without amplification that Bill was glad he'd been smart enough to leave his phone off speaker.

"Avoiding you? Nooo..." Bill hedged. He palmed bangs out of his face and winced at his abysmal lying skills. He was rusty. "Nothing. Absolutely nothing is going on. Nothing new to report, and a complete lack of funny business."

His mother sucked in a sigh. "Still sleeping with Tom? Baby..."

"I know. I know," Bill said glumly. "And, yeah. I just...I thought he'd be done after the one time, curiosity satisfied, back to status quo, you know?"

"Bill," his mother chided. "Did you really think that everything would go back to normal after sleeping with Tom?"

Bill shrugged uncomfortably, forgetting that his mother couldn't see him. "Well, we're both guys. Does it have to be complicated?"

"After sleeping with _Tom!?_ " his mother repeated, wry and gentle at the same time.

Bill raked a hand through his hair. "It was stupid," he said softly. "I...I couldn't believe that he wanted to. Still wants to. We, uh..." He shut up and flushed. He was _not_ going to get into a discussion on frequency with his mother. Tom seemed to be asking him over more often, setting a new record on Wednesday, which had only been the next day. He and Tom had skipped yesterday, though, because it had been beer and movie night and Andreas was always there for that. Bill was jerking off during his daily morning shower because he was too horny not to, but today he was ready to burst – it had been since Wednesday, and...

"Does he like you, Billy?" his mother prompted.

"Of course; he's my best friend," Bill answered with no hesitation.

"No..." His mother tsked. "You know what I meant."

Bill was quiet for a long time, watching his eastern-facing bedroom window fill up with light. He wondered. He didn't know. He thought, surely...

"Billy," his mother prompted, and he startled.

"Why would he?" Bill said at last. "He's straight. He's curious. He thinks I'm...pretty, or something; pretty enough to lay, and unattached, and so..." Bill blew out a frustrated sigh and swiped at his bangs again, tugging at them with a rough hand.

"You really think that's it?" his mother questioned, her tone soft.

Bill shrugged again, getting up and wedging his phone against his ear, beginning to pace impatiently. "Yes. No. Dunno. He likes it, Mom; it feels good for...uh, for both of us; of course he's gonna want to do it as much as he can." From the end of the bed he pivoted and made it to the kitchenette in a couple of strides and back again. "No matter how sweet he is about it, that's all there is."

"Is this the same Tom that you boys are always calling, 'One-Night Knock--" 

"Yes," Bill interrupted curtly.

"So why more than once with you--"

"Because," Bill cut her off again, and he'd been thinking about it so he had answers ready now. "He's straight, Mom. He's not going to want that to get out; word that he's, whatever, bi-curious. But who am I gonna tell? Anyone else...anyone else he approached might spread rumors everywhere about Big Gay Tom. And, let's face it, I _am_ the hottest boy on campus he could hope to have."

They both laughed, and his mother's was as strained as Bill's own humorless chuckle.

"Billy," his mother said after a moment, the two syllables packed with such loving kindness that Bill's throat closed tight. "You know...you already know, don't you?"

"Yeah," Bill managed to squeak out past his incorrigibly obstructed pipes. "Yeah, I know. Sex without love is so...it's so..."

They shared a sigh, and neither saw the need to sum the answer to Bill's equation.

"I wish I could protect you from this, Billy, I do," his mother continued, regret and sweetness transmitting through to him equally clearly. "I never wanted to see, or hear, your heart broken. This is something you have to figure out for yourself, baby."

Bill sniffed, rubbed at his thankfully dry nose, and nodded. "You're right," he said, drawing himself up to stand at his full height.

"I do hope you'll make the choice that's best for you, when you figure out what that is," she added. "Okay?"

"Okay," Bill repeated. He was strong for the moment. He pictured his day in front of him. He imagined going back to how it had been before, Tom-less, and his face fell. It was Saturday but Andreas was working this afternoon and Tom was guaranteed to invite him over. They hadn't done it since Wednesday, and that had been so...God. All they'd done was lay side by side, kissing and stroking each other until they came, and somehow it had still managed to be one of the hottest things they'd done so far. Heat flared and caught in his lower belly and Bill squeezed his thighs together, eyeing the shower. "I...I should go."

"Have a good day!" his mother called, and blew him a kiss through the phone. "Do the right thing, Billy. And if you're still dating that boy by Christmas, bring him home to meet us, okay?"

"Mom!" Bill squalled, mortified. He deployed the end call button savagely against the first peal of his mother's laughter. Then he sighed, clutched at his head, tumbled onto his back onto the bedspread, and gave consideration to a good, hard wank.

His phone chirped beside him and Bill propped himself up on one elbow, swiping a lazy finger over the touch surface of his phone until he retrieved the most recent text. He sighed. As he'd predicted.

From Tom, _join me fr lunch y/y?_

Bill began to tap out a reply, picturing himself as the meal. _ya wat hr?_

The reply came back fast, as though Tom had kept his phone open in his hand in anticipation or hope for a reply. Probably texting someone else, Bill thought.

_1 pm gud 4 u?_

_Ya, c u_ Bill texted back, and turned the screen off. He got up and headed for the bathroom. He was going to need that long shower.

When he got back, rubbing a towel over his wet head and pattering nakedly on damp feet through his studio apartment, the black shell of his phone was crowned with the green blink heralding new notifications. He found two from Andreas, begging copies or at least clarification of lecture notes, and one from Tom.

_cant wait 2 see u_

Bill grinned, scowled, hugged his phone to him then tossed it away, and toweled his hair vigorously until he was red and gasping. No good, he reminded himself. This was no good, continuing on his current course. Something had to give, and his poor heart was in line for first candidate.

Nevertheless, despite his half-formed resolutions, Bill presented himself at Tom and Andreas's doorstep promptly at one. Bill was dressed to kill, although he knew that the odds were better than even that his smartly put together outfit would end up in a heap on the floor. He didn't bother with cologne anymore, only scented moisturizer, knowing firsthand that Tom didn't like the taste of the first, and expressed indifference as to the palatability of the second.

The door swung open not long after Bill's knock and Tom stood on the threshold wearing a pole-axed expression and one of his less-huge t-shirts, jeans riding low as usual. He looked and smelled freshly-scrubbed enough to make Bill's mouth water by association.

"Wow," Tom uttered, and his next words seemed to slip out before he thought. "You look edible."

Bill widened his eyes. "Am I lunch?" he asked in a tiny voice, clutching at his mouth in dismay.

"Well," Tom said, ducking his head. He waved Bill into the apartment. "Come in? I could feast on you for hours, anyhow." The last was muttered almost low enough for Bill to miss.

Arousal kick-started in Bill's belly immediately. "I dressed nice because...you never know; might be going out for lunch," he said, turning to face Tom as his friend shut the door and leaned against it. Bill licked his lips and edged closer, ready to pounce.

"You haven't eaten, have you?" Tom asked suddenly.

"No," Bill answered, thrown off course. "Because we're having lunch..."

"Right," Tom said. "Good. I picked something up; I'll go heat it." He hurried off, leaving Bill stranded in the entryway staring after him forlornly.

"I really am an idiot," Bill said to his boots, and toed them off. What was it going to take, a sign from God? He should tell Tom over lunch that they shouldn't do it anymore, and skip out no matter what part of him, including the bits in his pants, thought about that.

And Tom would ask him why.

Why, when it made them both feel good? When Bill was unattached, and Tom likewise? When Bill had been insisting there was no one that he liked?

He sighed and put his face in in his hands, pressing the skin taut over muscle and bone. "I'm a trapped idiot," he finished quietly, so quietly. He entered the living room and scanned around with a critical eye. The place was beyond tidy; it was Tom-standard clean.

"Hey," Bill called.

Tom poked his head out of the kitchen. He had bound his dreadlocks up in a bandanna.

"Why is it so clean in here?" Bill continued, gesturing. He'd been over the night before and the spillage of barely-checked ruin had been entropy made manifest, as usual.

Tom's expectant face shuttered; became closed-off and unreadable. "No reason. Andreas..." He hesitated.

"Andreas what?" Bill prompted. "Suddenly became a neat freak, overnight? I don't think so."

Tom barely cracked a smile. "No."

"Oh, my God!" Bill swooned. "You've killed him, haven't you? You killed Andi!"

"Would you miss him?" Tom countered, and now he grinned, but it was faint. "No, it's...it's stupid. Andi's got something on me, that's all."

"Oh," Bill said, and without missing a beat, he continued, "what is it?"

"Nice try," Tom told him, raising his brows.

Bill pouted.

Tom laughed outright; laughed in Bill's face, the bastard. "Come over here and do that," he invited, holding an arm out. His mouth pursed into kissy-lips.

Bill backed away. "Oh, no you don't," he said. "This ain't my first rodeo. You don't get to ride _me_ hard until I've been fed at least enough calories to make it worth the effort."

Tom flashed him a sunny smile and disappeared so fast that he left the impression of swinging dreadlocks upon the air behind him.

Bill tried in vain to suppress a grin, more than chuffed that he could provoke that kind of reaction from Tom. He wanted sex, too, but he was discovering that he liked to make Tom work for it.

After a moment, Bill began to pick through the immaculately clean living room. He settled on the couch, then reached out toward the surface of the makeshift coffee table and pushed at Tom's silver phone, sending it into a spin. It chirruped with a notification and he held up his hands in a premature protestation of innocence. Then he leaned forward and eyed the sleek clamshell. Tom still had an older model phone, one of the types that didn't sport password protection, unlike Bill's.

Solemnly Bill folded his hands in his lap to avoid temptation. "Tom," he called. "Your phone's got a text, or something."

"Check it, will you?" Tom called back. "It's probably one of our ladies wanting to know about brunch tomorrow."

"Right," Bill said eagerly. Then he frowned. Shouldn't he have gotten a text, too? One of them usually sent a mass text to him, Tom, and Andreas.

Still, Tom had asked, so Bill would do it. He flipped open the clamshell and glanced at the screen.

The "from" contact was a punch to the gut.

Bill sat for a moment and sucked air, re-learning how to filter it through his lungs as his fist clenched hard enough around Tom's phone to make the plastic casing creak. At last, when numbness was washed away with an icy, deliberate rage, Bill relocated his legs and put them to use, striding for the kitchen. He almost made a detour to put his boots back on, the better to kick Tom's ass and walk out.

Tom turned from the kitchen counter with an easy, open grin that made Bill falter mid-step, but he hardened his heart. He was through; he'd found his rock to stand on.

"What the fuck is this?" Bill ground out between clenched teeth. He thrust the phone at Tom, display outward. Tom's smile dropped as though wiped clean off, and he squinted at it.

"It's...it's..." he began, and shook his head as though denying the sight of it. His nostrils flared and his face began to redden.

_want 2 c u again 2morrow_

"Ariel," Bill supplied, shoving the phone at Tom. "Here, _I_ don't want it. What is Ariel doing in your contacts, Tom? Do you like _her_?" Inside, below the layer of glacial fury, Bill was wrecked. All along he'd known that it couldn't last; that Tom would go back to girls, but for it to end like this... And with Ariel, of all the girls that Tom had been with. He couldn't pinpoint the moment he'd really begun to dislike her, but he was aware of it now.

"No!" Tom shouted. He grabbed at his phone as Bill tossed it at him. He straightened and faced Bill head-on, his dark eyes snapping and his cheeks crimson. "Fuck, no; Bill, I--"

"Fucking is exactly the issue, though, isn't it, Tom?" Bill shot back.

Tom stiffened. "You think I'm fucking her?" he demanded, dangerously quiet.

"Aren't you?" Bill yelled, flinging one arm wide.

"No!" Tom yelled back. "No, goddamn it, Bill, I'm not fucking her! Why would you think...? No!"

Bill clenched his fists. He hadn't ruled out the prospect of belting a good one to Tom's handsome face. "Because you don't give them your cell phone number, Tom! And you sure as hell never program their damned names into your fucking...your fucking address book!" He gave a bitter little laugh. Tom had already made exceptions to his established habits for Bill; why not for Ariel, too? "Why do you even need me if you're fucking her?"

Why Ariel? Why _Ariel?_

"Bill," Tom said, stepping forward and moving as though to grab him by the arms.

"Don't touch me," Bill snarled, smacking at Tom's hands and stepping back out of reach.

"What? It's not-- Bill, I swear, it's not--"

"If you say 'it's not what it looks like,' Tom, I am telling you right now I will fucking deck you," Bill said, giving him fair warning.

Tom looked hurt. He folded his arms over his chest, pulling his t-shirt taut over his front. "Okay. What do I say, then, Bill?"

Bill floundered. He'd expected Tom to continue to deny it, leaving Bill to froth and work himself up to declaring that he refused to enable Tom in cheating on his girlfriend, then Bill would declare they were over as...as whatever they were; maybe even friends. Then he'd storm out, slamming the door hard enough to splinter framework on his way out.

Now...were those fucking _woobie eyes!?_

"I am not the bad guy, here!" Bill declared firmly.

"I'm not, either!" Tom insisted.

"Well...what the hell!" Bill exclaimed, wanting to snatch the cell phone back from Tom for the pleasure of chucking it at him again.

"Bill, I wouldn't two-ti--" Tom shook his head. "I'm not; I'm just not, okay? Can't you believe me? I wouldn't...I wouldn't do that."

 _Because you've already had her,_ Bill thought snidely, and turned away.

"Bill," Tom said again, approaching with a tentative shuffle.

"So why's her name--" Bill began. He cut himself off, waving a hand, shaking his head furiously until dark hair flared around his face. "Forget it; you know what, I don't want to know."

"It's there because _she_ put it there," Tom groaned, palming his forehead. "That's _all._ "

"And she wants to meet you tomorrow," Bill reminded him. He wasn't going to ask when Ariel had had the chance to add herself to Tom's contacts. "When _we_ have brunch." He reminded himself sternly that it was brunch for all of them; not merely the two of them, and Tom wouldn't take it that way but it certainly sounded possessive coming out of his mouth.

"Just because she wants to see me, doesn't mean I will," Tom said tightly.

Bill stared at his socks and realized that they were two different colors. Subtle, but the difference was there. He'd been in such a rush to get over to Tom's that he'd even fucking worn different _socks_. "Tom..." he said softly, shifting his gaze to the fridge, to the oven, anything in the kitchen but Tom. There were notes pinned up on a cork board over the fridge; a whiteboard with chores written out for each day of the week and several days with a name smudged out and "Tom" written over it in Andreas's handwriting; and take-out menus held up with credit card advertisement magnets. Displayed prominently to one side of the cork was a photo of Tom and Bill that Andreas had taken, both of them grinning like idiots, Tom giving him bunny ears as Bill put his elbow in Tom's side, looking utterly happy.

_I can't._

"Bill," Tom responded, touching his shoulder; moving closer when Bill didn't hit him, then touching the side of his face. "Just...I'm not, okay? It's only you."

Nodding, Bill swiveled back to Tom and looked him in the eye. "All right," he said, his shoulders slumping to suppress a shudder. _Only me?_ That sounded like a confession. "All right, okay, I'm...I'm not going to say I'm sorry." Of course Tom was too pragmatic to have sex with more than one person at a time, even though he probably had the drive.

Tom laughed and tossed his cell phone at the kitchen table. He gathered Bill into the half-circle of one arm, pressing a kiss to his cheekbone. "That's fair..."

Bill turned into the loose embrace, gathering up fistfuls of Tom's shirt in his hands, bunching it up and pulling him close. "Tom," he spoke up, and said it a little more desperately. "Tom..." After telling himself he didn't have the right, after acknowledging that he had no claim, he went and got that jealous over what was apparently nothing.

"Come here," Tom told him, hands descending to his hips.

He should say no. He should tell Tom they couldn't, because what had happened just now was the perfect illustration why. Tom was straight; their little interlude of exploration couldn't last.

"Bill," Tom said, warm breath stirring against his ear. He pressed his mouth there in the next moment, then over his cheekbone, angling for his mouth but delivering a kiss to his nose instead.

Say no, Bill urged himself, shutting his eyes. _Say no, and get the hell out of here._

"Are you still hungry?" Tom spoke against the corner of his mouth before pressing a small kiss there.

"No," Bill said hoarsely, firm about it. He inhaled, opening his mouth to clarify, and Tom's mouth came down on his, lips fitting, tongue pressing in at once and finding his tongue stud. Bill groaned and ran his hands down lower, delving into the front of Tom's jeans.

They kissed, slow exploratory nibbles shifting into urgency, Bill biting at Tom's tongue and whimpering because although they were close, they could be closer. Tom's mouth moved hotly over his and Bill leaned into it, kissing back every bit as hard. At last he paid attention to what his hands were doing, and stroked along the top of Tom's boxers, the pads of his fingers running over firm stomach and along stray hairs. They broke the kiss and Tom breathed against his mouth, apparently too turned on to function for a second. Bill began to grin in spite of himself, and dipped a hand into Tom's boxers, seeking the vital heat below.

"Unh," Tom grunted, pushing against him and licking his way back into Bill's mouth.

Bill opened his mouth to him, eyes fluttering shut. He stroked past the trail of crisp wiry hair and followed it to Tom's cock, shaping his hand to fit around it. It was so hot, branding his palm with the sense-memory of it as Bill moved his hand over Tom's swelling dick and thrust his tongue against Tom's with a gasp. His chest was tight and his belly churned with rising excitement; he was so riled up he didn't know if he was going to be sick, or have a panic attack, or come on the spot. _Don't_ was running amok with _don't stop_ and Bill was a shaking mess in the crossroads. He pressed against Tom's thigh, already hard and getting harder, and pulled at Tom's cock to make it grow in his hand.

Tom dragged his mouth away.

"Nooo," Bill moaned, and this denial was definitely not firm; it didn't mean what he intended. It pretty much sounded like, _Fuck, Tom, keep going._

Tom chuckled, the sound low and husky, and curved his hands around from Bill's hips to cup his ass, pulling their bodies closer. He nudged at Bill with the thigh between his legs then stepped forward, crowding Bill back until they slammed against the kitchen counter before he dipped his head to Bill's neck. 

Bill panted, shoving against Tom's thigh with the desperate whimper he hated, yet couldn't seem to contain when Tom's hands were on his body. Tom's hands were making circles on his ass, pressing them close, relaxing, doing it again. Bill thumbed the head of Tom's cock, twisted his hand around the head, and panted harder when it flexed in his hand. He wanted it.

Tom left off nibbling and sucking at Bill's neck, lipped at Bill's ear, then said in a gravelly voice, "Want to do it right against the counter? Right here; God, want you so much." His fingers clenched on Bill's ass, one hand grabbing Bill right at the middle seam.

Bill pulled his hand from Tom's cock and set both palms against Tom's sternum, finding a grain of resolve or at least sense again. "No," he stated, sucking in his swollen bottom lip. He thought about saying it again for emphasis.

Tom blinked at him and his face dropped. His grip on Bill loosened and he looked several levels beyond disappointment; Christmas was cancelled.

"Not...not in the kitchen again," Bill gasped, still weirded out that they had done it over the table the other day. He inhaled as Tom's face lit up, then squeaked as Tom's arms went around him in a crushing hug, lifting him up off the ground against his body.

"Okay," Tom said against his ear, sounding overwhelmed. He set him down and stroked a hand up Bill's back, the other still riding low on his ass. "Bedroom?"

"Yeah," Bill said, dropping his head to Tom's shoulder, nudging his lips up against bare skin and flicking his tongue out to taste. He really was no good at this; no good at saying 'no.' "I...I want to try something new."

"Really?" Tom said eagerly. He pulled back far enough to look at Bill's face, dark eyes searching. Then he did something unexpected; he took Bill's hand and lifted it, pressing it against his cheek, kissing the palm. His teeth dented the heel of Bill's hand ever so slightly.

"Ouch," Bill protested, though it hadn't hurt. "Cannibal! You're not having me for lunch."

"Come on," Tom said, closing his eyes for a second and inhaling deeply. Then he leaned in against Bill, molding their bodies together from chest to thigh, and reached past him to twist the oven knob to turn it off. "Or I'm going to do something you don't want to."

They rushed through the apartment as best they could with Tom stopping every other step to turn and kiss Bill, or press his mouth to Bill's ear, or dip his head and nuzzle Bill's collarbones. Bill was every bit as bad, grabbing at Tom's shirt and tugging him to a halt, crashing their mouths together until teeth stung his lip and their tongues worked frantic double-time in liquid heat.

Tom lifted his head to separate their mouths and Bill made a little murbling noise of protest. He slid his hand up Tom's shirt and leaned against him, fanning a hand out over Tom's stomach, thumbing his navel.

"If you keep doing that," Tom panted, "I'm going to spread you right here, you have to know that."

Bill shook his head until Tom's dreadlocks tickled his cheek. "No," he said again, getting used to the sound of it. See, he told himself; he could say no to Tom. "No--ah!"

Tom reeled him in by the belt buckle and gave him a wet kiss with more than a hint of tongue. "So let's go," he said against Bill's moist lips, and hauled him along.

They stumbled together down the hall. Bill was tugging at Tom's shirt before they even got through the door. Once they did, Tom hooked it shut with one leg and pushed Bill up against it, kissing and licking at his mouth and stripping his pants and belt off. When he leaned back, regarding Bill with fever-bright eyes, Bill was still trying to decide whether he wanted to get his lips on Tom's mouth or his cock.

"What do you want?" Tom asked him, cupping the side of his face. "Bill, what do you want?"

Bill struggled with Tom's shirt until Tom lifted his arms, cooperating with its removal. He ran his hands up and down the tawny skin he revealed, ducking to bite a nipple and make Tom jerk against him. He opened his lips over the well at the base of Tom's throat and licked the skin there. He trembled and he didn't bother to try and hide it.

"Bill." Tom's breath ghosted against his ear. "What do you want?"

Bill leaned back enough to lock eyes with Tom again. "Get your pants off and lie on the bed," he said, his voice ragged but certain. "Put a condom on and get the lube out."

Tom's eyes went comically wide. "Really?" he rasped.

Bill nodded and licked his lips, recognizing that this would be the most active role he'd taken in their sex so far. He wanted it; he wanted to do, and not be done by. He'd start taking control with this.

Tom made an explosive noise and ducked forward, snaring Bill into the crook of one arm and kissing him breathless, then he headed for the bed shedding his pants along the way.

Biting his lip, Bill admired Tom's ass for a blank moment, standing in place with one hand pressed against his groin. He shook himself and got moving again as Tom rummaged through the bedstand.

He peeled off his shirts, dropping them behind them and letting clothes fall where they would, then stood beside the bed in his boxers. The afternoon sunlight was slanting in behind Tom's bed, pouring through a chink between curtains and forming a corona around his shoulders as the lighter pieces of dreadlock caught and concentrated the light. Tom's mouth was open, his eyes drawn, expression faintly orgasmic and already wrecked.

"Please," he said, and Bill shoved his boxers down and climbed astride him.

Tom steadied him with a hand on his waist and gave him a slow-blooming smile as Bill settled over his pelvis, adjusting his position until Tom's cock lined up with the crease of his ass.

Bill was already panting his anticipation. He bit his lip, not quite believing he was about to do this. "I need...I'm gonna need your help," he said, nodding to the lube by Tom's elbow then holding up his hand to display his nails.

"Oh! Oh yeah..." Tom grabbed at the lube so fast, the tube shot out of his hands.

Bill laughed and rested his forehead against Tom's as he grinned sheepishly. "A little eager?"

"Fuck, yes."

 _Fuck being the operative word,_ was on the tip of Bill's tongue but it was too close to what he'd said earlier, during their ugly argument. He kept his mouth occupied with Tom's, instead, as Tom filled him finger by finger with enough slippery gel to make Bill ready to take him, all of him.

Bill leaned back and his eyes were wide open to watch Tom as he reached back to guide Tom to his body with an unsteady hand.

"You sure you want to do it like this?" Tom asked him worriedly, as Bill drew his lip between his teeth and winced anticipation.

A moan slipped free from between the teeth clamped over Bill's lip and he gave several quick anxious little nods as the tip of Tom's cock nudged past his entrance, hot enough to make him feel it even through the condom. "I'm...oh!...sure; but you're not exactly small, you know." Bill sat back, ignoring the not so little grin his complaint had elicited. He bore down, letting his weight draw Tom's hard length into his ass. Not that he had a lot to compare by, but he knew Tom was bigger than average, though not huge, thank God; and that was plenty big enough.

"Oh...fuck!...good, because I don't think I could stop you," Tom got out, squeezing his eyes shut. His hands stroked over Bill's hips, hovering over the skin there with a light enough touch that Bill couldn't distinguish whether it tickled or felt really, really good.

Bill took his time about sinking down onto Tom's cock, and Tom coped with the pace like a champion. He laid there and watched Bill's face; the only thing that moved were his hands, caressing back and forth over the skin of Bill's hips and waist. Not a single objection or demand to hurry up left his lips, and he didn't grab Bill and push his own way in.

At last Bill was settled and full, forehead damp with sweat and chest tight with that bowstring-taut mix of anxiety and arousal. His butt pressed against Tom's flat pelvis and balls and he was sure he'd never been so stretched open, replete with Tom, already set to explode like the first time Tom had set a hand to his cock.

"I'm gonna...I'm gonna move," Bill threatened, already doing so as he rocked forward to fasten his lips over Tom's piercing.

"Yes, please," Tom mumbled into his mouth.

Bill thrilled his hips in an urgent circle and cried out at how good that was; so fucking good. Tom was pressing up huge inside of him in all of the best ways.

"Oh my God," Tom groaned, and Bill did it again, and again, and again, a curious sense of pride bursting open inside of him.

 _I'm doing this_ , Bill thought with satisfaction, lifting himself up on his thighs and forward to change the angle. _This is how I do Tom._ He moved faster, bracing himself with a hand against Tom's shoulder, the other stroking over Tom's belly between them.

Tom worked at Bill's nipples as Bill rode him. He cupped Bill's pectorals in broad hands, rolling his nipples between thumbs and forefingers. He rubbed at them, stroking his thumbs over and round. He teased them insistently with fingernails and the pads of his digits and Bill whimpered, driving his hips faster, arching to take as much of Tom's cock as possible as it brushed maddeningly close to his prostate.

"You like that? Don't you, Bill?" Tom whispered heavily, licking his lips and tugging Bill's nipples again.

"Yeah," Bill whispered back, rocking back and forth. He was sweating all over; it was running down his spine. He nodded and rocked faster, crazed with lust. All the while Tom touched his nipples and gazed up into his face with undivided concentration. Bill began to nod again more fiercely, a counterbalance to the pendulum swing of his hips. "Yeah, yes; I like it so much."

Tom's mouth sagged open and he pushed up into Bill, making him moan and strive harder, faster. "How much? How much do you like it?"

"So much," Bill groaned, the deep sound sprung from the very center of him. _Too much_ , he wanted to say, and his mouth shaped it but something else came out. "So much; don't wanna stop, wanna do this forever."

"Good," Tom moaned, and Bill's eyes flew open. Tom's forehead was dewed with sweat and he stared raptly back at Bill. "Good, so good, you're so...unh!...good, Bill." He thrust up, angling himself within Bill, making them both cry out.

They did it for a long time like that, until the angle of the sun shifted, moving away from the window. Bill lost track of the afternoon, enthralled in this new stimulation, thighs aching but delight spiking up through his middle again and again. He kept looking down at his bobbing erection, surprised there wasn't come flowing from it yet; then happy that meant he could keep going, and so he did. Tom stayed hard inside him and Bill rode and rode.

Bill moved and ground astride Tom until his gasps arose from pain, not pleasure. "Hurts," he admitted at last, wincing. Tom rolled Bill off him and onto his back, examining him before reapplying lube, then he pushed into Bill so slow and tenderly that Bill thought he might die of it. He reached up to stroke Tom's dreadlocks as Tom hovered over him, pulsing inside him.

"Go," Bill urged him. 

"You sure?" Tom questioned, wincing and looking down between their bodies. "You're so..."

"Yeah, do it," Bill breathed, squeezing his eyes shut and bracing himself on the coverlet, lifting himself up into the first thrust that Tom didn't quite dare to initiate. He hissed and Tom grunted, looking surprised and hot, so hot, as he began to move atop Bill. "Finish it; do it, do me."

Tom touched Bill's cheek and thrust a little faster. "Bill, I..." He lifted Bill up onto his thighs, deepening the angle and bending his legs up toward his chest.

"Fuck!" Bill howled, his scream drowning whatever Tom had been about to say as his overdue climax pounded through him with the ruinous force of a tidal wave unfurling. He convulsed under Tom, calling out his name and clawing at his back.

"Bill!" Tom was yelling, pumping into him with rough and no longer considerate strokes that were still so good, hitting Bill's spot and making him come even harder. "Bill...ah, ahh, Bill!" He was louder than he'd ever been. He collapsed half on Bill, half onto his side.

"Mmm," Bill uttered luxuriantly, stretching beneath Tom. He knew he'd never come so hard in his life. "Move over, you're heavy."

"Uh-huh," was Tom's response, and he shifted just enough for Bill to wriggle out from beneath him.

"Wow," Bill said, sprawling limp and spent on his side, one hand cupping his own belly. He swore he still felt Tom inside of him. "I can't believe we needed more lube."

"Mm-hmm," Tom mumbled, fading fast.

Bill grinned at him, but it was a sad grimace of a smile. He stroked Tom's sweaty dreadlocks away from his face and leaned over him, close enough to kiss. Tom's eyes were already shut.

"I have to go," Bill told him. He reached down to rub one buttock and winced. He'd be feeling it tomorrow.

Tom nodded vaguely, his lips moving in the mimicry of a kiss.

Bill pursed his own lips, but didn't brush them over Tom's. It was like the beginning of the end. First the little 'no,' then the one that mattered. Sex without reciprocal emotion while he was this desperately in love was breaking him to pieces; he wanted more. It wasn't fair to ask for something that had never been part of the deal to begin with.

Bill gathered up his clothes with dreamy lassitude from where they'd fallen and been tossed. He glanced back to Tom several times, to where he lay snoozing in bed, as he got into the clothes they'd pulled off so hastily together. At last, he couldn't delay any longer. He supposed that part of him had been hoping Tom would wake and ask where he was going; demand he stay - and not for sex. Simple togetherness was what Bill ached for right now.

The living room was dark as Bill picked his way through it, the light having fallen away and leaching all but shadows from what remained. He tried to remember where he'd dropped his keys between the door and Tom's bedroom.

"Bill?" The name formed a startled bubble of sound on the still air.

"Oh, shit!" Bill yelped, one hand flying to his mouth as though to catch and restrain the exclamation. "Andi?"

Andreas was sitting on the couch in the darkened living room, half-reclining, still wearing his rumpled work uniform. He was doing a pretty good imitation of an oxygen-starved fish. "That was you...but _Tom_ was...oh my God, you and Tom!?'

"Shut up, you'll wake him!" Bill hissed, mortified. Had he really ridden Tom's dick for that long? "You're supposed to be at work!"

"They had a slow shift and sent me home early; _you_ and _Tom!?_ " Andreas exclaimed, quieter but still charged. "Oh Jesus the headboard was banging and he was yelling your name and I think I need a brain bleach treatment. Or that flashy thing from MIB to erase the last ten minutes."

Bill approached the coffee table, snatched up his keys, and backed away fast. "Hope that works out for you! I have to go, so..." He didn't even wave. He fled on unsteady legs, thighs already protesting because he'd fucked Tom.

And now Andreas knew it.


	12. Chapter 12

"Bill, I'm going to the Hair Lair to put some streaks in; will you come with and help me pick a color?"

Bill made wide eyes at Andreas over his last mouthful of artisan bagel and light cream cheese. He swallowed and asked his friend dryly, "Do I have to?"

"I'm thinking about red and green stripes," Andreas said with shining eyes.

Bill shot to his feet and grabbed his clutch. "Wow, you're a disaster waiting to happen. Let's go." He looked around the bagel shop furtively, catching Tom's puppy-sad eyes and forcing himself to look away.

They had met up with their dorm friends for brunch that morning, and for a little while Bill had been able to forget. Then Tom had picked out a spot and clearly saved a seat for Bill beside him, pulling out a chair and leaning on it, waving him over, and instead Bill had dropped into a chair across the table from him. He'd immersed himself in chatter with the girls to either side of him and done his level best to avoid both Tom and Andreas, eyes or conversation-wise.

He was sore; God, he was sore. He'd woken up with such a burn in his thighs and chafed tenderness down there that he'd promised himself that if Tom wanted to get laid again, the only way it would happen was if Bill did the penetrating. Then he had remembered Andreas had _seen_ , and he wanted to sink into his bedclothes and never emerge to see the light of day again.

He had joined up with his friends for brunch anyhow, but it had been something of a goal of his to avoid being alone with anyone but girls that day. He'd been managing pretty capably...

"Text me later?" Tom entreated as they left, and the girls cooed in Bill's direction and waved goodbye.

Bill waved back, watching the girl beside Tom lean up against him, either grabbing a brief non-consensual cuddle or stealing something off his tray. They looked good together. His time with Tom had been a brief interruption to the natural order of things. Tom and a pretty girl; that was how things were. It was how they'd been, and how they would be.

Not even one step out of the shop, Andreas turned to him and demanded, "How did it happen? Bill? Did he...did he force you?"

"No!" Bill exclaimed, appalled. He wrinkled his nose. Maybe he'd been strong-armed a little, but... He put his head to the side. 'Forced' was definitely over the top.

"He's a really smooth talker," Andreas fretted. "He must have manipulated you into it, Bill; what about waiting for The One?"

Bill shifted from one foot to the other. "This isn't the Matrix, Andreas," he said uneasily. "It's not like I need to wait for some impossible ideal to come take my virginity. Besides, I don't even like Keanu Reeves."

Andreas shook his head. "Tom really got to you," he observed. "But...he's straight; you know that, right?"

Bill kicked his ankle and danced up the sidewalk. "Can we not talk about this?" he demanded. "Let's talk hair; the salon is right around the corner and you have a decision to make."

"Oh, that was a lie," Andreas admitted frankly. "I needed to get you away from Tom for a minute."

Bill glared at him. "Fuck you, Andi!" he stated, reversing course and turning back for the bagel shop. "Maybe I don't want to talk about it. Maybe I've got this under control." Maybe he was still a pretty poor liar, he added in his thoughts.

"No, wait!" Andreas grabbed his arm, hauling them both to a stop. "I know you love him, Bill, but are you really sure that you should be doing this?"

Bill stood frozen as though Andreas had tossed a bucket of ice water over him. "What did you say?" he uttered in a cracked whisper, numb.

Andreas quirked him a curious look. "Which part?"

"You know...what do _you_ know?" Bill blustered, wrenching his arm free of Andreas's grasp.

"Let's go around the corner," Andreas suggested, looking over Bill's shoulder. "In case they finish up, and reach the street. I don't think we should still be here."

Meek and wordless, Bill let himself be led. In his interactions with the world, he'd been able to count on many things. Tom was hot and Bill wanted him, body and brain and stupid jokes and ridic jeans and all. Music was the constant thrumming undercurrent of his life. His mother was wise and witty, too damned perceptive and full of love for him to handle sometimes. His friends were few but solid, and when they needed him, he was there. Andreas was hilarious and goofy and had a crap sense of timing, and he was the poster child for male obliviousness.

Only...not.

"What did you say?" Bill repeated, louder, trying to drown out the white noise that rang through him when Andreas gave him that look of sympathy.

"Bill, it would take some kind of blind deaf mute to not see you're in love with Tom," Andreas informed him. "So that explains why you're doing it. But why is he...I mean, I know he said some stuff, and even...ugh, yelled out some stuff...but that doesn't make him any less straight."

Andreas steered him to a bus bench and Bill let him, unresisting. "Bill?"

"I know. I know," Bill said dully. He sucked in a breath and drew his legs up onto the bench, wrapping his arms around them and pressing them tight against his chest. "You're right. I...I let him because he wanted to, and I...I love him." An odd spasm traveled through his diaphragm as he set the words loose, admitting it out loud at last. He shuddered. His eyes were dry and he felt freer.

Andreas looked worried. "How long has this been going on?"

Bill snorted. "Not that tuned in, are you?"

Andreas narrowed his eyes. "Bill, I'm asking because he's dating Ariel. Like, _dating_ her. Gotten dressed up and taken her out and gone to dinner dates and everything. I found a torn-up receipt for flowers in the trash."

Bill gaped. It wouldn't process. He had nothing, not even the icy fury that had gripped him yesterday when he'd thought Tom was fucking her. "...What?"

"Dating her like she's his girlfriend," Andreas said. "Since last week."

When Bill realized that he was breathing fast and shallowly, he put his head between his knees. It didn't help. "Well, he's not my boyfriend; it's not like he's cheating on me!" Bill said shrilly.

"How long has this been going on?" Andreas asked him again.

Bill looked over at him, setting his cheek on one knee. "A few weeks now," he admitted.

Andreas rocked back. "Weeks!? Dude..."

"Not so obvious now, am I?" Bill said, snide.

"Well, Tom's been acting stupider than usual for about that long," Andreas said slowly. "And I hadn't seen any girls until Ariel last week, so I guess that fits."

Bill shook his head, messing up his hair and uncaring for once. "Fuck," he said to his knees.

"Why don't you just...stop?" Andreas asked him.

Bill lifted his head again and looked at him. "Because I'm an idiot? Because he wants to, and said we should keep doing it as long as there's no one I like." He wanted, badly, to ask more about Ariel and yet at the same time, not.

Tom had lied to him.

Andreas sighed. "You know you should just cut him off, right? This is...it's no good for you, Bill. It's not going anywhere."

Bill tipped his head back until it thunked against the wooden bench backing. "I know," he replied quietly. The sky above was so blue, empty and overturned, the bottom of a sugar bowl upended and all the sweetness run out. He thought of Tom's blue sheets wrapped around him, around the two of them, and shivered as the wind blew against his exposed neck and hands.

He wasn't angry anymore; he was only sad. Maybe in a little while he'd lose the numbness and try to figure out how to patch this suddenly-gaping wound.

"I know I have to end it," Bill said aloud. "I just have to figure out how."

Andreas patted his arm awkwardly and sat beside him for a while, until Bill told him to go away. He knew how to find his own way home, at least.

The next day Bill woke up and turned his phone off. He shoveled breakfast into his mouth without tasting it and turned music on without hearing it and watched the first bus pass by without seeing it. He wore flat-soled shoes and put on the first thing to fall off his steel clothing racks and pulled his hair back without brushing it.

On his way out of his eleven am sociology class, he plodded past Tom and it took three calls of "hey" and a hand on his shoulder to stop Bill in his tracks.

"Oh," Bill said, blinking at him. He didn't have a smile for Tom. He didn't have anything. "What do you want?"

Tom squinted at him, withdrew his hand, and said, "Lunch? Bill...you okay?"

"Fine," Bill replied, doling out the automatic answer. He managed to say it without meeting Tom's eyes. "Right, lunch. Let's get lunch." He wasn't hungry, but it was what they did.

Tom hesitated, then moved as though he'd cup Bill's elbow to guide him along the path that cut across the Quad. Bill twitched and launched himself into a ground-eating stride, walking away from him.

"Wait...wait up!"

Bill huffed and folded his arms, recognizing that he was being childish but not quite able to help himself. He stopped, tapping his foot until Tom caught up, shuffling with one hand hitching at the waistband of his jeans.

"What's got you so pissed?" Tom asked outright, reaching out for his arm again, pulling away when Bill jerked out of range.

"Nothing!" Bill snapped. He inhaled slowly and tried that again. "Nothing. I've...I've got a lot on my mind. I'm..." He stopped. _I'm not doing it with you anymore._

"Have you eaten today?" Tom asked him quietly.

Bill frowned at the sidewalk.

"Okay, if you have to think about it, let's go," Tom told him. He took firm hold of Bill's elbow now, ignoring his hissed protests and steering him for the student union building.

Bill grumbled but he went along with it. He was barely aware that he had a stomach, right now, but he was sure that he could shovel it in anyhow.

"Did you eat today?" Tom persisted.

"I don't remember," Bill said honestly.

Beside him, Tom sighed. It made Bill want to snap and demand, _what makes you think your life is so hard?_ He was the one who'd been fucked over. Finding out that Tom had been dating Ariel and deliberately keeping it from him was a pretty blatant slap to the face letting him know that Tom wasn't in love with him; couldn't love him that way. He was for girls and always had been.

"It's more than that, isn't it?" Tom said. He let go of Bill's elbow.

"Y-Yeah," Bill stuttered, breaking into a cold sweat. Could he say it? But he wasn't going to lie to Tom.

"We shouldn't have done it," Tom said abruptly.

Bill's head swung up and over. "Wh-what?" His voice cracked; the word squeezed out painfully.

Tom's hand went up, tangling around the one frayed dreadlock. It was going to snap off, Bill thought dazedly, if he kept working it over like that. "When you...on Saturday," Tom clarified. "Now you're wearing flats, you're having trouble walking, and you're pissed at me. I knew we shouldn't've..."

"Tom!" Bill flailed.

"Well?" Tom challenged.

Bill snorted and folded his arms, facing the other direction. "It's not...that isn't...argh, shut up, just shut up!" He couldn't even deny it, because he _was_ still sore. In a very small voice, he said, "Am I really walking funny?" At last, he met Tom's eyes.

Tom's eyes crinkled up in a muted smile. "You haven't eaten all day, and that's what you're worried about? I dunno, it could be only that I'm not used to seeing you walk around without those clunky boots of yours."

"Those 'clunky boots,'" Bill began haughtily, "are high fashion, Tom. Something you know and care nothing about."

Tom laughed. "Yeah, yeah. Only whatever rubs off from you by association, I guess. Come on, you've got an enthralling choice between chicken fingers, and fish and chips."

"Ugh," Bill responded. "Or I could get about five boats of mozzarella sticks. That would fill me up, right?

"Or bind you up," Tom muttered, sounding shifty.

"What was that!?" Bill exclaimed, truly shocked.

"Nothing! Hurry, we should get in line before the rush hits."

Bill glared at Tom resentfully as his friend made a fast shuffle up the sidewalk, passing him by. He dropped a hand to one of his buttcheeks and winced. Yeah, he was still store, but he'd been so sure it hadn't impaired his walking gait. If Tom had noticed, though...

It was colder than usual that day and the student union was packed. Bill let himself be herded into line by Tom, crossing his arms over his middle and at last recognizing the uncomfortable pang as more than the roil of his own anger and hurt and conflicting emotions. He watched Tom out of the corner of his eye as they stood in line, and cracked a smile at last as Tom caught him looking and contorted his face in a series of increasingly silly expressions.

"You sure you're okay?" Tom asked him as they reached the head of the line. He rubbed at Bill's shoulder. "You seem down about something."

Bill's chin dipped and that, rather than anything before, made his eyes smart with the imminent threat of tears. Tom's sympathy was what he couldn't handle. He turned away, shrugging Tom's hand off and stepping up to order. "Fine." He sniffed hard, defenses shored up by the dully incurious stare of the cashier, and rattled off an order of fried food large enough to provoke a 'whoa' from Tom behind him.

The chill of the windswept patio would normally dictate indoor seating, but Bill carried his tray out of doors with a stubborn set to his chin, and Tom followed.

"You sure about this? It's freezing out here," Tom noted.

Bill shrugged. "I don't mind a cold butt," he replied.

Tom snickered and Bill cast about for something to throw at him, settling on a few ketchup packets and getting him good. One stuck in the nest of his dreadlocks and Tom stopped laughing.

"What?" Tom demanded. "Only because you don't have much of an ass to get cold; that's all, not...not..." He shut up. The red bloom in his cheeks could be the weather, but Bill wondered.

"You seem to like my ass just fine," Bill observed, and caught his breath. This was dangerous territory.

"More than just your ass," Tom muttered, and his cheeks were definitely redder than before.

 _Oh?_ Bill wanted to inquire, but chided himself to get off that subject as he slid into a seat that faced the Quad. The wind tugged at his hair and clothes with fierce chilled fingers and he hunched over his plate, watching the food steam its heat into the air. Hunger bit his stomach with a series of mournful gurgles and he reached for a chicken finger, suddenly sure he could shove the whole thing into his mouth without even choking.

Tom slid into the seat beside him, rather than across from him. He glanced sidelong at Bill and chuckled, shaking his head, then bit into his own burger. He tore open the ketchup that Bill had thrown at him and pooled it beside his fries.

"Where's Andreas?" Bill asked, muffled, around a delicious influx of cheesy goodness.

"Who cares," Tom said sourly, making Bill's eyes round with surprise.

"Got a problem with Andi?" Bill asked, keeping his tone mild. His heart was knocking around his ribs like a mad thing.

Tom sighed, one thumb going up to massage the bridge of his nose. "Yeah, but it's nothing you need to worry about. I've got it taken care of, effective today."

Bill snuffled and wiped his nose with the back of one sleeve, and wondered whether it had anything to with Ariel. Surely Ariel was what Andreas 'had' over Tom. Maybe the two of them were going public today. "Well, he's making class at one, isn't he?"

Tom shrugged and took a bigger bite of his burger.

After bolting his food, Bill regarded his flotilla of empty fast food boats and patted his stomach in awe.

"I'd say I wouldn't believe you put all of that away, but I've seen you do it before," Tom said with a laugh. "God, Bill; eat much?"

"Sometimes," Bill responded vaguely. He looked around the patio. It was pretty obvious that Andreas wouldn't be joining them today, considering it was ten till one. Maybe Andreas thought he should give Bill time to end things with Tom, if he'd figured out how.

He folded his hands together and clamped them between his thighs to hide the tremor that was going through them. Bill was going to have to simply blurt it out, the way he was accustomed to saying anything that sprang to mind, small or large. _By the way, you know all of the fucking we've been doing? It has to stop._ He shook his head faintly. Nothing had changed. So far as Tom was concerned, there still wasn't anybody that Bill liked, so...

He would want a reason. Bill had to dredge up a reason to give him, a solid one.

"We should get going for class, I guess," Tom said, breaking the silence that had wrapped around them for the past few minutes.

Bill nodded mechanically, staring down the Quad. Despite the chancy weather, there were still plenty of students scattered over the yellowing grass. Most of them were wrapped in thermal jackets or flannel, hair streaming in the fitful gusts of wind that passed through.

Tom leaned over, mouth brushing against his ear. "Come over tonight?"

Bill sat up straighter, not exactly pulling away but the realignment of his spine brought him out of Tom's range. His mouth twitched and the slightest thread of sound left him. "What about track?" He was sick inside. He couldn't believe Tom was still asking him; he couldn't believe Tom's _lies_. Tom had probably taken Ariel out as recently as last night, if her Saturday text was any indication.

Tom's dark eyes traveled away from Bill, darting restlessly over the Quad. The bright green of the grass was beginning to dull as the shorter, rain-free days deprived it of everything it needed. He lifted one finger to snare a frizzing dreadlock. "Track's over," he said with a ring of finality, face expressionless.

"Oh...for the season?" Bill said, caught by surprise. He thought he remembered Tom's practices going on longer during the previous year.

Tom's jaw flexed, but he nodded.

"We'd better get to class," Bill said evasively, and got to his feet. He grabbed his tray but Tom pulled it right from his hands.

"I mean it, Bill," he told him. "Come over. I've got something I want to tell you."

Bill glanced around the patio, one hand going up to his hair before remembering it was pulled back; he had nothing to tug on. His face was naked, exposed. "Why can't you tell me here?"

"Too many people," Tom replied seriously, then gave him a little smile. "So?"

Bill drew an unsteady breath. "Yeah, I...I'll see you later," he said, but it still wasn't really a yes, necessarily, because of course he'd see Tom later. But it wasn't a no, either.

He couldn't tell Tom 'no,' because it was Tom doing the asking.

Bill didn't have anyone _he_ was dating, so why not be with Tom that way?

At their comp lit class, Bill saved a seat for Andreas because it became clear that Tom wouldn't, and sure enough their friend slid into the lecture auditorium before the echo of the last bell had faded from the classroom. Andreas gave him a solemn nod, unlike his usual sunny smile, and that was reminder enough for Bill. He quirked a brow inquiringly as though to ask, so, how did it go?

_This is no good for you, Bill. It's not going anywhere._

Bill shook his head faintly and shrank back into his chair, wrapping an arm tightly across his front. He hated being pressured into things, and this new concern of Andreas's, the way he was butting in as though he had every right to be involved, was making Bill perversely stubborn.

After class, Andreas made his dash for work, and Tom rose and headed for the exit, pressing a hand to Bill's shoulder in passing.

"I have to go," he told him. "I've got a meeting right at two, so...see you later?"

Bill's lips twitched. "See you later," he echoed. When Tom's eyes stayed on him, somber, a frown settling into place, Bill tried harder to summon up a smile.

"Okay," Tom said at last, and lifted a hand in farewell.

Bill copied the gesture, raising his hand and positioning it until he couldn't see Tom's past his own bony fingers. A sudden devastation crashed over him, as though he were really saying goodbye to Tom; as though this was it. He knew he'd probably catch the bus over to Tom's, though, because what else was there in his life to make him get up in the morning? He knew he didn't _have_ Tom, but...only that bit of Tom he did have was enough, maybe.

_Make the choice that's best for you, when you figure out what that is._

Bill inhaled as though he'd been slapped as his mother's words returned to him. He pushed himself up out of his chair.

The Quad was colder as Bill made his way to music composition class and he huddled miserably upon himself, wishing that he'd thought to bring a jacket that morning. He hadn't been thinking of much of anything, and that was a large share of the problem.

"Hey! Bill!"

Bill halted in place outside the music building, peering through a sudden red and brown flurry of leaves that swept around him.

Georg jogged up to greet him with an easy smile that vanished as soon as he reached Bill's side. "Come on," he said, latching a hand around Bill's wrist. "Today, we're skipping."

"Oh, no, I can't--" Bill began to protest, and Georg cut him off with a stern look.

"Bill, you look as though someone just killed your dog, which for you means it's probably way worse, whatever it is," Georg told him. "Skipping is healthy for you, in small doses. You haven't missed a class the entire semester, and music composition allows up to three unexcused. So let's go."

"This is a bad idea," Bill groused, but he stumbled along as Georg guided him up the sidewalk.

"Coffee, tea, or booze?" Georg offered.

Bill gave him suspicious eyes. "It's way too early to drink," he said at last.

"Tea it is," Georg decided. "Come on, there's a nice café right up the street."

Bill knew. He'd often spent hours doing his homework there.

Georg didn't barrage him with any questions or even do more than make a few casual observations about the weather, to which Bill responded noncommittally, until they were settled at a table in a far nook of the café. True to his word, he acquired tea – a potful, and a cup for each of them – then settled across from Bill with an intent, thoughtful expression.

"You can talk about it, if you want," Georg offered at last. He settled into his chair and hung an arm over the back. "Or we could just sit here. Whatever makes you comfortable."

Bill gave him a wan smile.

"You're looking pretty upset," Georg observed.

Nodding, Bill cupped his hands around the warmth of his tea and looked through the clear brownish liquid to the sediment at the bottom. Where to start?

"Girl trouble?" Georg ventured.

Bill snorted. In a matter of speaking, he supposed. He wasn't a violent person; he'd always been a pacifist, though more focused on animal rights. There was one person he could quite cheerfully take an ax to, though.

"Boy trouble?" Georg continued, his tone gentle.

"...Yes," Bill said at last. "It's...I'm...remember that I said it's complicated?"

"Yeah," Georg said. "I remember."

"It's Tom," Bill confessed.

One side of Georg's mouth lifted, but he seemed entirely unsurprised.

"God," Bill uttered, smacking the table with a frustrated palm. "Does everybody know I'm in love with Tom!?'

"Well, your face did kind of light up when he walked through the door the other day," Georg offered. "Together with what you'd mentioned earlier, it did make it kind of ob—well, let's just say I figured it out."

"Right," Bill muttered, and sipped at his tea, which had cooled enough for him to put his lips on.

"So, what's the problem?" Georg said, raising a brow. "You love him; he's--"

"He's straight," Bill interrupted.

Georg's other brow rose to join the first. "Really."

"Yeah," Bill said. "Yeah, have you heard of the One-Night Knockout?"

Georg rocked back in his seat. "No way!" he exclaimed. "That's Tom? But he....with you..."

"Shhh!" Bill hissed, waving his hands madly. He was having deja vu back to that first aghast conversation with Andreas. "Not so loud, okay? Yeah, he...he wanted to, with me; he was curious, I guess. And...and..." He slumped over the table, pushing his teacup around.

"And you wanted to, with him, because you love him," Georg finished gently. "So you did, clearly. Now what?"

"He doesn't love me," Bill said. He picked up his tea and slugged it down, then set the cup back on the table and stared at it as though the scattering of leaves at the bottom held the answers to his dilemma.

Georg opened his mouth, shut it, frowned, then he reached to pour Bill more tea.

"Besides," Bill continued, reaching the point of aggrievement now. "I found out yesterday from our mutual friend that he's been dating someone, a girl, since last week. He's never actually dated a girl before."

"Then he's just stupid," Georg said sharply, setting the teapot down with a clatter. "When he could have you? He's either brain-damaged, or--"

"Straight," Bill interrupted, drawing himself into an upright posture. "He's straight, Georg. That was...I mean, what we're doing is like a game, I guess; a way to pass time, figure things out sexually, no matter how I feel about him."

"Present tense," Georg noted.

Bill devoted his attention to the renewed cup of tea before him. "What?" he mumbled, pretending not to understand.

"You used the present tense, meaning you're still...with him," Georg said delicately. "When you found out he's dating a girl, now. Why, Bill?" He looked as though he'd say more, but shut his mouth.

"Because I can't tell him 'no,'" Bill said miserably. "Because I told him there's no one I like right now, and...and he said we should keep doing it as long as there's no one I like." He rounded his shoulders and fitted his fingertips around his teacup again, swirling it round and round and watching the orange-brown liquid slosh. He realized he didn't know what it tasted like. He hadn't tasted anything all day.

Georg sighed and pushed his own tea back and forth. "Do you really want to stop?"

"No. Yes," Bill added, and groaned. "I think I shouldn't, anymore. With him."

Georg nodded, dark brows gathering together. "Have you tried talking to him about this?"

"God, no!" Bill said, appalled. "Besides, I already know how it would end up." On his back. Or on his side. Or on his knees with his ass raised in the air. He flushed.

Georg must have intuited enough regarding the content of how it would end from Bill's expression, because he didn't ask. "Then, tell him you've got someone that you like," he said pragmatically.

Still flushing, Bill bent his head over his tea. "But there isn't," he said. There was no one he could acknowledge besides Tom, right now.

"I get that," Georg said sympathetically. "But clearly he's too oblivious to realize that, so all you have to do is tell him that there's someone."

Bill shook his head in despair. "Won't work," he said. "I thought of that already. Tom's persistent. He'll want to know who it is."

"Find someone willing to be a stand-in," Georg suggested.

Bill blinked. "Hmm..." Then he shook his head. "No way. Who'd I find to do that? Not Andreas; Tom would scare the truth out of him in about two seconds."

Georg flipped his hair over his shoulder and grinned at Bill as though he were being particularly dense or stubborn. "Bill...there's plenty of people who care about you enough to volunteer, I'm sure."

Bill shrugged and drained his tea again, looking around furtively for the bathroom. "Yeah, well, not without knowing more about the situation than I'm probably willing to tell," he said. "Bad enough I let Tom sleep with me; I don't want his secret to get out all over campus."

The smile dropped from Georg's face and he eyed him seriously. He placed his hands flat on the table, thumbs and forefingers framing his teacup. "Well, you've already told me, and I'm not going to tell anyone."

Bill nodded gratefully. He brushed his fingers over one side of his own teacup, making it wobble. He had to grab at it to prevent it from rolling off the table and Georg's next words caught him by surprise.

"Will I do? Bill?" Georg asked with an earnest smile. "I'm offering my services to be the person that you like. So..."

Bill blurted his answer before he could think, or stop himself.

"Yes."


	13. Chapter 13

"You should come to my live show this Friday," Georg said, scuffing a pile of leaves out of Bill's way as they turned the corner on the way to the bus stop.

Bill gave him a wan smile. "I might have to," he said, folding his arms across his chest and trying to suppress a shiver. It wasn't the cold this time that wracked him; it was the enormity of what he was about to do. He might not be welcome at beer and movie night on Friday. Hell, Tom might be out with his girlfriend. "I dunno how this is all going to work out."

"He's going to have to understand," Georg said firmly. "He can't string you along and date someone behind your back--"

"I told you, Tom and I were never dating," Bill said, wrinkling his nose in irritation.

"But you were involved," Georg was quick to point out. "And it's clear that finding out about that girl was the final straw for you."

Bill was quiet for a moment, kicking at stray leaf clumps as they continued up the sidewalk. It had rained while they were in the café and the sidewalk was slick and slate-dark, painted over with wet-stuck leaves in dark gold and red and burnished orange. "What if sleeping with me is keeping him from committing to someone?" he said at last. "Maybe...not her, but someone. Maybe doing it with me so many times helped him figure out that he can be with someone like that more than once. I don't want to hold him back."

Georg groaned and facepalmed. Bill swung his head up, startled.

"What?" he demanded, worried that Georg might have reconsidered, or thought of something that Bill hadn't.

"You've got it bad, Bill," Georg told him. "That's no good for me, you know? I'm going to have to work harder to take him off your mind."

Bill peered at him. "That's not...I mean, you don't have to," he objected.

"As long as you keep looking like that, I'm going to want to," Georg replied, giving Bill a crooked grin. They came to a halt at the bench beside the bus stop and Georg rummaged in his pockets, fishing out what looked like a crumpled bit of kleenex. With a few rips and the deft shaping of his fingers, he turned it into a pale snow-driven rose and offered it to Bill. "Here. It's not used, I promise."

Bill's mouth tugged upward inadvertently and he took the rose from Georg. "...Thank you," he said. He tucked it behind his ear after checking his shirt for usable button-holes and coming up lacking.

"You're very welcome," Georg told him. He broke into a charming smile. "So you're not sure about Friday. How about tomorrow night?"

"How about tomorrow night, what?" Bill parroted curiously. "Have you got a live show then, too?" He thought he remembered Georg telling him that he worked. He was probably off tomorrow, then.

"No," Georg said, raising his brows. "We should go out. You know, in case Tom wants to...make any demands on your time."

"Oh, my God!" Bill cried, hands flying up to his face.

"What?" Georg said. He rocked forward on the balls of his feet, peering anxiously up at Bill.

"It's just...I...I...kind of agreed with Tom that I'd...you know, see him tonight," Bill said, eyeing the toes of his flats and tapping them against the wet sidewalk, first one, then the other. "Our friend – his roommate – is at work, and he...he invited me over, so..."

"Don't go," Georg said at once.

Bill gaped at him. "What?"

Georg shrugged. "Who says you have to go? You want to stop sleeping with him, Bill. It's easier to do if you're, you know, not there with him."

"You're right," Bill said faintly. It hadn't occurred to him to go to that extent, but perhaps it should have. Remove himself from the equation. Their original deal was long since spent, so the clause about not running no longer applied.

Georg fixed a sincere look on him. "It's up to you, Bill. No one can make you do anything you don't want to."

"I did want to," Bill said, as though it were an admission.

Georg slipped his hands into his jacket pockets and gave Bill an understanding smile. "Can I have a tense check, there, Bill?"

"...Do want to," Bill admitted. "But, I won't. I just...can't anymore." He glanced up the street, somewhat relieved to see the bus trundling up the road toward him. It wasn't the Blue line, the bus that would take him to Tom.

Georg stepped close to him, paused, then gathered Bill up in a surprise hug. He was warm and his arms were strong, his chest solid. He smelled good; a melange of hair product and cidery-cedar cologne and clean boy. Bill closed his eyes and let himself be held.

"What was that for?" he inquired, when Georg released him as the bus puffed to a halt on squeaky hydraulics.

Georg bent a wry but sweet smile on him. "You looked like you needed it, right then."

"Oh," Bill said, backing away, then turning to climb the first step. He reached up to check on the rose in his hair; it was still secured over his ear. "Then, thanks."

"Don't mention it," Georg told him, and waved him off.

Bill collapsed onto an unoccupied bus seat with no neighbors and heaved a sigh as he looked out the window onto the suddenly grey day. The blue skies had been overtaken with flat, featureless clouds that held the promise of more rain. He touched the corners of his eyes and found them still dry.

"What am I doing," he said softly aloud, and stuck his tongue out when an older woman across the aisle and several seats down made a disparaging noise and hitched herself around to face away from Bill.

He stuck his hands in his pockets to warm them, and found his phone where he'd haphazardly jammed it. He swore as he recalled he'd turned it off that morning.

When the display lit up, he had two missed calls, one from a number he didn't recognize, the other from his mother. That would have to wait until later. There were also three missed texts and with trepidation, he thumbed down the menu to view them.

One from Andreas, two from Tom.

Bill fretted his lip and weighed the merits of deletion versus facing down anything that might tempt him to reverse his decision. In the end, curiosity won over expedience and he opened Tom's texts.

_went by ur class n ur not there - u ok?_

_checking to make sure were on for 2night. I need to c u._

Bill sucked in a harsh breath and turned his screen off, dropping his phone into his bag and huddling over his knees, embracing himself. He could do with another of Georg's hugs again, he thought, even though right then all his body wanted was Tom.

He went home, instead, and cooked a dinner he had no real intention of eating. He kept his phone on his hip and sang to himself softly, ignoring the notifications as they came in. After a while, his voice cracked halfway through "Love Ridden" and he abandoned his attempts to keep himself company. He scraped pasta from a scorched pot into the trash, curled up at the end of his bed with his thrashed lyrics notebook, and brushed his fingers over the cool plastic shell of his phone. It chirped at him again.

"I can't," he told himself apologetically. He shut his notebook and tossed it across the room.

After pacing for a bit and ignoring the phone bouncing at his hip, he settled at his computer desk with the intention of doing homework. He opened an essay on music history and stared at his introductory paragraphs, going over the words with no comprehension as to their meaning. With a sigh, he closed his essay and opened up a game of Solitaire, cheating shamelessly after his first few hands.

When his phone rang the first time, Bill jumped up out of his chair and nearly threw his cell across the room. He glanced at the display as though the ringtone hadn't already told him. Tom was calling.

Bill inhaled, squeezed his eyes shut, then squared his shoulders. It was time to man up.

His thumb slipped and he sent the call to voicemail.

"Shit!" he groaned. Who set those two buttons so close together, anyhow?

While he had it out in his hand, he reasoned, it would be a good time to check his texts.

All seven of them were from Tom.

"God, Tom," he breathed. As he moved to open them, the phone vibrated in his hand and began playing Tom's ringtone again. This time, he clutched it between his hands until it stopped ringing, then he banged the heel of his hand against his forehead a few times as though that would help dislodge his idiocy. Now he moved to check his texts, from the most recent on earlier, and as he watched, the green notification light flashed and another appeared.

_plz pick up_

_bill r u home? thot u r coming ovr?_

_need to c u tonight. we dont have to do anything, i need to tell you smth_

_stopped by ur apt and ur not here, u ok?_

_pick up ur phone_

_r u ignoring me_

_hey where r u_

_still on campus, want to go home w/me?_

Bill moaned feebly and threw his phone at the bed. This wasn't working, avoiding Tom and hoping he would stop calling, stop texting. It was why Bill had known he'd need a solid reason in the first place in order to turn him down. Tom's persistence was on the order of legendary.

Instead of dealing, he dressed down and got into his rattiest pair of track pants, some old, thick comfy socks, and a thermal shirt beneath a skinny hoodie. The phone rang twice while he was getting dressed and he flinched. "Shut up!" he yelled at it, feeling stupid and trapped. He left his phone where it was and opened the front door.

It was pouring outside; a veritable November monsoon.

"Shit," Bill muttered, scuffing one sneaker across the threshold and staring resentfully at the rain. It was spoiling his plans for escape. He hated getting wet and sopping even more than cats did. As he stood watching the rain stream down over the gutters outside the narrow ledge lining his apartment, the phone rang behind him again.

"All right," Bill said at last, defeated. The very stars were aligning against him. He straightened his spine into perfect posture, slammed the door on the rain, and turned back for the bed. Tom was going to keep calling until he gave him an answer, after all.

He fiddled with his phone's settings for a moment, biting his lip. Then he opened Tom's most recent text and hit 'reply.'

 _cant do this anymore,_ he typed out, and stared at the dark words against the white screen for several minutes before finally thumbing 'send.' His heart was a trip-hammer in his ears, louder than the muted growl of thunder outside.

The phone rang again, and Bill cradled it in his hands like a lifeline. He laid down on his side on the bed, scooting across it until he reached the place where his comforter was folded back the way he'd flung it off him that morning, and pulled it over him for warmth.

For a long, cowardly moment Bill considered not answering it, or sending it to voicemail again. What would he say? Why did he need to say anything? It wasn't as though he owed Tom – Tom had been fucking Ariel, after all, but beyond that he'd _lied._ That was what Bill couldn't forgive.

Bill scrunched his face up, then hit the answer button and brought the phone to his ear. He inhaled, and that was enough.

"What do you mean, you can't do this anymore?" Tom demanded directly in his ear. His voice was shaking.

Bill tugged harder on his comforter, rolling over on one side and wrapping himself into a human burrito. "Just what I said," he replied, pained. He'd guessed that Tom wasn't going to let it go, though he couldn't figure out why; but Tom had been weirdly insistent from the start. "I can't...Tom, I can't anymore." He shifted his tongue in his mouth until his tongue stud fitted gently between his teeth. Occam's razor; simplest slice was best.

Tom was silent for so many heartbeats that Bill checked his phone for reception. "Why?" Tom asked at last, tight and pained, as though the words had trouble emerging.

 _Because I love you too much_ , welled up on his tongue, and it was a good thing that Bill still had his tongue stud between his teeth. Otherwise he might have said it. He disengaged the bead of his stud as he turned over answers in his head that would make for acceptable substitutes. "You said we should keep doing it as long as I didn't have someone..." he began.

"You don't have anyone right now," Tom started desperately. "Not anyone but--"

"That's not true," Bill interrupted. He closed his eyes and sat up in a burst of energy, throwing his comforter away from him and turning for the window. Rain streaked down the glass in endless rivulets, little streams that joined with heavy droplets and pulled them in new directions, courses in which they might never have been intended. The weight of water beat against his window and he listened to Tom's hoarse breathing.

"You're dating someone and you didn't tell me?" Tom said at last, injured. 

"I just started going out with him," Bill replied quietly. He closed his eyes again, annoyed and devastated at Tom's response, the expectation that Bill would have told him before. As though Bill would have kept it from him, the way Tom had kept Ariel from him.

“You said I'd be the first to know,” Tom said, sounding pained.

"I'm telling you now,” Bill replied. “And so, I can't anymore."

Tom's breath sped up and Bill tried not to picture it, to see himself there in Tom's bed – in his arms – with Tom wrapped around him and the two of them moving slow, so slow until Bill shivered to pieces in his grip. He couldn't stop thinking about the way they'd done it last week, after getting pizza at the pool hall, when Tom had laid down next to him and kissed him and caressed him until he'd come. Only that and nothing more, as though Tom's kisses were all he needed to float away on euphoria; that and the dark eyes that never left him. He wanted to be there right now more than he wanted his own safety, his own self-worth.

"Bill," Tom said, and that was a sound that made Bill bite his lip. His name in Tom's mouth, though it wasn't a pleasure-wracked sound right now. There was only hurt. "Do you think he's the one?"

Bill shut his eyes and wrapped an arm around his knees. He thought of Georg's wry smile and his firm hug; recalled the courtly gesture of the flower, and the fact that he'd offered to be Bill's pretext in the first place. "No. Maybe. I don't know."

"You don't sound too sure," Tom pressed. "What's so great about this guy?"

Bill began to nod even though Tom couldn't see him. "Well, he's...he's considerate," he began, certain this was a bad idea, talking about this with Tom. They were friends, he reminded himself. It was the kind of question a friend would ask. He didn't want that to change. "He pays attention to me. He knows when I'm not feeling well even when I think I've managed to pull it together in spite of that...he listens to me, but he encourages me to make up my own mind." He sighed, watching the rain pattering harder against the window now.

"When he...when he holds me, I feel safe," Bill continued, and had to pause as his voice threatened to give out on him. He swallowed. "He smells good, and he does little things for me. Stuff other people might not notice, but I do. He's...persistent; he made sure I would notice him, even though I tried to get away. He makes me smile, and laugh. All the time. And he's always taking care of me. Practically since the day we met." His throat closed by the end and he wondered for an eerie moment who he'd been describing.

"So, you like him." Tom's voice cracked.

"Yeah," Bill confirmed.

Silence again, until Bill checked the connection on his phone. Was Tom still there? He couldn't even hear breathing anymore.

"Do you think...Bill, do you think you could like me?"

"Oh, God!" Bill groaned aloud, grinding a fist into his eye, uncaring about the makeup he was smearing everywhere. How could Tom do this to him? He didn't know; he couldn't know that Bill already _did._ Too much. He couldn't help stumbling as he answered. "I do l-like you, Tom."

"But not...the way that you like him," Tom concluded.

Bill held his breath for a moment. His sinuses were tight and tears waited, sharp and plundering, at the corner of his eyes. "No," he said softly, and it was the truth, only the truth. He liked Tom so much _more,_ and it was bad for both of them.

Tom took in a sharp breath, then there was more silence.

The seconds ticked past. Bill watched the rain bluster harder against his window, tearing up the night outside. There was something tickling his cheek and he rubbed at it, then looked at the moisture on his fingers as though it were a foreign substance.

"Tom?" Bill said, when he couldn't bear the silence any longer. He knew that Tom was still there. There was no way he'd hang up.

A noncommittal grunt answered him, letting him know Tom was still on the line.

"We're still friends, right?" Bill said quickly, squeezing his eyes shut. His nose was clogging shut already and he hadn't even really cried. Was it possible for them to stay friends? God, he still wanted it. Instead of his stupid blanket he wanted Tom's arms around him right now.

"We always have been, Bill," Tom said after a moment. "You're not going to take that away from me, too, are you?"

"No!" Bill choked out. "No, I...no way. You're my best friend, Tom." He hugged himself desperately close and it wasn't enough. Tom was more, so much more, and that was why Bill had to do this now before he got in too deep. If that hadn't already happened.

Tom hesitated, then after a long moment he said, "You're my best friend, too, Bill." His words were labored, as though each one had been a struggle to get out.

Bill smiled involuntarily and wiped at his face again. He had to get off the phone soon before his voice failed him. "I...I'm not going to say I'm sorry," he whispered. _Because I'm not sorry for any of it._ He wouldn't trade a single moment or take any of it back.

"Got it," Tom said after a moment, voice still hoarse. "See you...see you tomorrow?"

"As usual," Bill said, forcing a chuckle. "See you tomorrow." He hung up and the strained mirthless sound of his laughter morphed into a pained wheeze. 

"Bye, Tom. I love you," he told the blank oblong of his silenced phone. Bill wiped at his face and let the tears fall where they would.

He lay on his side and clutched and his phone, crying without sobs, tears dripping off the end of his nose until he couldn't stand himself anymore. He got up, washed his face in the bathroom, and avoided his own eyes. He couldn't bear the desolation or even the accusations he knew he'd find. After a while he shambled over to the bed and grabbed his phone up, dialing a familiar number, holding it close to his ear when the line picked up.

"Mom." Bill could barely squeeze out the word. "I did it. It's over."


	14. Chapter 14

The rattle against the window made Bill's head jerk up from where he'd propped his cheek against one palm to give himself the semblance of attentiveness as he bent his head over lecture notes, half-sleeping. He cursed softly under his breath as he took in the rain that was sheeting down over the window beside him. Having woken late that morning after half a night of pillow-thumping sleeplessness, he'd rushed to throw himself together to get to campus on time.

He'd completely forgotten to grab an umbrella on his way out the door.

Annoyed, Bill rattled the bead of his tongue stud against his front teeth. He tried to recall if his brightly Impressionistic umbrella clashed with his outfit, looked down at his front, and decided sadly that it did. A quiet hiss escaped him, low like a teakettle building steam, at the thought of going out into the rain and getting soaked. Even if he hadn't spent the hour and change to which he was accustomed on his grooming that day, he hated getting wet more than he hated almost anything. Tom often called him 'bratty cat' when it rained... He sucked in a breath and tried to divert his thoughts as the dull ache of remembrance descended again.

Bill kept his eyes on the rain-lashed window as the professor's lecture droned to a close. The weather outside was like an extension of his torrentially abysmal mood. He'd talked to his mother last night, but it had done precious little good because all he wanted was arms around him, and the comforting presence that brought a sense of aching completion that even she couldn't provide. He was afraid to see Tom today, half convinced he'd hurl himself at his friend and ask to take it all back.

Tom would probably let him. That was the worst part. Even knowing what he did about Ariel, and the increasing imbalance of his own love without Tom's answering emotion, Bill was far gone enough to return to that impossible situation rather than keep feeling this badly.

It hurt. He hurt more now than at any sling and arrow that life had ever thrown.

When the bell rang, Bill roused from another light doze with a blush for the deteriorated state of his notes. It wasn't even an early lecture, but he was crashing. His notes had started out halfway decent, and become disjointed, illegible scribbles that even he couldn't read. He gathered up his things and fought a series of yawns, then stood and eyed the double doors of the auditorium with trepidation. Whatever else had hit him in the past forty-eight hours, his hatred of water pattering over him without his consent hadn't diminished one whit.

Bill lurked in the archway outside the auditorium, squinting through the downpour and pretending he was looking for a lessening of rainfall instead of Tom. He sighed and checked his phone. No messages, no missed calls. 

"Hey! Bill!"

Bill quivered on point for an instant before he realized the voice wasn't as deep, and was smoother, more mellow. He plastered on a smile as Georg approached from the right, sheltered by an immense navy umbrella with vents to keep it steady in the wind. "Hey, Georg."

"How are you?" Georg asked him. He gave Bill an encouraging look.

"I'll be a sodden mess in a second, if I take a step outside of this archway," Bill said with a laugh that came out sharper than he intended.

"Well, come over here!" Georg urged with a gesture, stepping forward until he stood in the archway and parted the spillage of rain over the dome of his umbrella. "Share with me; it's certainly big enough. I'll get you to the student union unscathed."

"Thanks," Bill said gratefully, clutching backpack and handbag close and stepping beneath the shelter of Georg's massive umbrella. He bobbled as they began to walk. He was unsteady in his heels on the wet pavement and the slightest mis-step could send him lurching into the pouring rain.

"Here," Georg said, and tucked an arm around his waist. "Grab onto my umbrella with your other hand. That's better, yeah?"

"Um," Bill mumbled, his cheeks growing hot. It was too close.

"It's okay," Georg soothed him, possibly intuiting his distress. "The union's not very far and the last thing you need this morning is a fall and a broken ankle, yeah?"

Bill snorted. "Don't joke, Georg. I'll do it." The way his luck had been going lately...

Georg's arm tightened around him. "Not on my watch," he informed Bill.

It was reassuring, and it lifted Bill's melancholia somewhat. He liked being taken care of when he was this poorly off, and Georg was filling in quite capably, but he yearned for someone else. It was bittersweet; good to have someone, just plain sad wishing that the person with him was someone else.

They walked the entire length of the Quad and the rain drummed steady fingers over the dome of Georg's umbrella. It fell in constant sheets, and the growling dark clouds overhead let Bill know that it wasn't likely to taper off any time soon.

"I wish it would stop raining," he said wistfully.

"Well, you know, it can't rain all the time," Georg responded.

Bill craned his neck, eyes wide, to catch Georg's expression. The upperclassman was wearing a wry sort of half-smile and he tilted his head inquiringly as their eyes met.

"You like that movie?" Bill asked him, shy all of a sudden. It wasn't so much the way Georg was looking at him as it was the intimacy of their current walking configuration. Now there was this unexpected jolt of a little mutual connection. He loved happy endings, and the first time he'd watched "The Crow" it had devastated him until he fixed on the fact that they had gone together, in the end.

"I do," Georg said thoughtfully. "I believe that real love is forever."

Bill gave him a sad smile. "But how do you know real love when you have it?"

"Ah," Georg said. "That's the thing. I think it's different for everyone, you know? And it should be mutual, though I suppose it isn't always. Watch this step, here."

Bill was careful about the placement of his feet as they stepped from sidewalk up to the patio. All he needed that day was to stumble on wet patio stones and take Georg out along with him.

"So," Georg said at last, pivoting and releasing Bill, spinning him out beneath the overhang of the umbrella with a dancer's flair though keeping a hand on him until Bill stood steady on his own. "Here we are. Delivered safe, as promised."

"Thank you," Bill said gratefully. He eyed the continual downpour over Georg's shoulder with distaste. "I have no idea how I'm going to cope with the rest of the day. Wish I could go home."

He'd thought about it that morning, curled up warm and swollen-eyed in the nest of his blankets, too apathetic to get up and put steeped English breakfast teabags over his lids. It had been tempting, so tempting, but even the jagged ruin of his heartbreak and the certainty of seeing Tom couldn't make him skip more class. It wasn't the lure of Gaulthier keeping him going; rather, at this point it was sheer determination not to crumble under the weight of this.

"Hang in there," Georg said with a full smile, eyebrows quirking to give him a bracing look. "The day will be over before you know it, and you'll finish up with your music workshop – not a bad way to end it, right?"

"That's why I scheduled it that way," Bill said with a nod.

"Chin up, kid," Georg said. "So, how about going out tonight? It'll keep your mind occupied, and if you're invited over again..."

"I don't think he's going to invite me over again," Bill said, trying not to sound wistful. He recalled his unsuccessful forays into accomplishing homework last night and figured that Georg probably had the right idea. It sounded suspiciously like a date, though Georg hadn't used the word. Bill was trying not to let it fluster him. He truly did need the distraction.

"Not to mention there's the pleasure of my smiling face at the end of the day," Georg said with a self-deprecating smirk.

"Hey, don't underestimate the benefit of a smiling face," Bill told him. He dredged up one of his own, though he knew it was a pretty weak effort. "Thank God I don't have anything due the rest of this week, I'm totally useless. So, um. Okay? Let's go out."

"Great." Georg gave him a broad smile, then raised a hand with pinky and thumb extended. "So, call me later?

"Okay! It's a...a plan," Bill said, deliberately avoiding phrasing that would set them on date footing. He wondered at his own hesitance for a moment.

He wouldn't mind dating Georg. He was attentive, sweet to Bill, good looking, and he smelled nice. Altogether he was a great catch as far as the campus scene went and Bill was a little surprised he didn't have someone already. He had all of the virtues that Bill had listed out the night before, and more. He was gallant and had a nice smile and he'd been going out of his way for Bill.

The crux of the matter was: he wasn't Tom.

Georg's eyes went past Bill's shoulders and his smile turned contemplative, even sly. He leaned in close to Bill, holding the umbrella over both of them and closing the distance until Bill got a sudden thrilling fright that he was about to be kissed. Instead, Georg lifted his free hand and brushed through one side of his hair.

Bill's eyes fluttered and he inhaled, about to question Georg, when the senior leaned back and displayed a bright crimson leaf, five-pointed. Enlightened, Bill accepted the leaf that Georg had plucked from his hair.

"Pretty," he murmured, admiring the damp but still vibrant leaf. He could press it or use it for a textbook mark when it dried.

"So's the leaf," Georg told him with a half-smile.

"Georg," Bill said, not exactly surprised but kind of embarrassed that he'd said it out _loud_.

"Come on," Georg said, ignoring the moment and walking toward the nearest of doors in the row of double doors that opened onto the back of the student union from the patio. "Let's get you someplace warm and dry, shall we?" He turned without looking, trusting Bill to tag along and stay beneath the brim of his umbrella for shelter.

"Thanks," Bill said again, turning on the threshold as Georg held the door open for him. He held up his leaf by the stem as though it were another flower, giving the senior a smile.

"It's my pleasure," Georg replied, then took a half-step back and closed his umbrella with a quick, practiced twist. He pressed the handle into Bill's hand. "See you later." Then, before Bill could form so much as a protest, he dragged the door shut and jogged off into the pouring rain.

"Now, that's not fair!" Bill protested to the closing door. He sighed a little, shifting the dripping umbrella in his grip, then caught sight of a reflection in the glass of the door. He turned, his stomach performing a stupidly hopeful flip. "Oh! Hi." Before he could even help himself, he was flashing a pleased grin at Tom, so helplessly happy to see him as always.

The corners of Tom's mouth barely lifted in response. "Hey," he replied, trying to hide something behind his back. "Was that...him?" He craned his head a little as though attempting to take stock of Georg even through the closed door and the darkness of the rain outside.

"What's that?" Bill asked, flourishing his leaf for Tom's right side, where something was poorly concealed.

"Oh, it's...it's nothing," Tom said with downcast eyes, though he let his hand drop to reveal not one, but two umbrellas dangling from his wrist by their nylon cords, tangled and bumping together.

"You brought me an umbrella?" Bill asked softly, glancing down to the one that Georg had pressed on him only the instant before. He wanted to shove his behind his back, only to take the one that Tom had brought for him. It was a stupid impulse; Tom already saw that he had an umbrella in his hand.

"Yeah, I...I thought you'd probably forget yours," Tom said. The beginnings of a smile tugged at his mouth, then he lowered his head again. "Looks like your boyfriend's got you taken care of, though."

"He's not--" Bill began to protest, then shut up. What was the point of going through that horrendous scene last night if he was going to turn around and deny it?

They stood there awkwardly for a moment and Bill let Georg's umbrella drip over the skid-proof mats on the floor beneath him, trying to find the right thing to say. Tom had promised him they were still friends, of course, but that didn't mean it would be easy. They both had to make an effort and right now all of Bill's was pretty much centered around not throwing his arms around Tom and recanting.

"It's okay if you want to have lunch with him, you know," Tom said, dipping his head and bringing up his umbrella-free hand to tug at one free-dangling dreadlock. He'd pulled most of his hair up under a beanie today, probably on account of the rain.

"No," Bill said quickly. "It's all right. He had to go." He bit his lip. _I'd rather have lunch with you._

Tom heaved a sigh. "Well, sorry I'm late," he told him, turning to stride for the stairwell that would lead them to the lower level and the food stations. "I...it's been a pretty shitty day, so..."

 _I'm sorry,_ was on the tip of his tongue as he hurried to keep pace with Tom. He swallowed it, because he'd already told Tom he wouldn't say he was sorry, hadn't he? It would be like taking back everything they'd done, as far as he was concerned.

"Gonna be okay?" he prompted instead, trying to sound light and encouraging.

Tom's jaw tightened. "Gonna have to be," he said cryptically. "Remember when I told you I'm having trouble with Stat?"

"Oh, no," Bill murmured, recalling with a grimace. No wonder Tom was in a bad mood. He was used to getting top grades in all his classes, but mathematical formulas really were his Waterloo. "Did you...are you..."

"It's too late to drop out," Tom stated. "I already knew that, but I checked again. I...don't have a legitimate hardship reason, and I was doing okay earlier in the semester before the cut-off point, so I'm fucked."

"That sucks, that really sucks," Bill said, aghast. He worried that his involvement with Tom had played a role, getting him to put off his homework in favor of doing Bill. Then he recalled Andreas's disclosure that Tom was dating Ariel - _really dating her_ \- and he steeled his heart. "What about getting a tutor?"

"I don't think it's going to do much good at this point," Tom said fatalistically. He shrugged, and looked at Bill with dull eyes. "So I'll fail a class. I don't know if it even matters anymore."

Bill frowned at him. "That doesn't sound like you, Tom," he objected. "For as long as I've known you--"

"Well, maybe you don't know me that well," Tom interrupted curtly.

Bill inhaled sharply. "Don't," he said, his voice low and warning. "Don't do this, Tom." _Please don't let this get weird._ A denied Tom was a sullen Tom, but this was so much worse. It was like the fight had drained out of Tom, as though he'd taken...

Taken something really valuable from Tom.

"Tom, I--"

"Your eyes are red," Tom interrupted. "You okay?"

"Y-Yeah," Bill faltered. "I, uh...I..." _Cried all night. Had trouble sleeping last night. Can't get over you._

Instead, he said, "I had to pull an all-nighter, I have some deadlines creeping up." Not quite a lie. He did have deadlines – next week – and he had been up all night. The problem was that he couldn't concentrate on any of it.

"Really," Tom said. He glanced at Bill as he headed for the line that snaked out from the pizza station. It was densely packed today, again, as everyone took advantage of the closer options at the student union with bad weather upon them rather than ranging farther afield. He seemed to hesitate, then as Bill got into line beside him he said, "Well, I'm sorry. For...for keeping you from your studies for so long."

Bill's jaw dropped. "I'm not!" he objected at once. "That was...Tom, that was why I said last night, I'm not going to say I'm sorry. I don't regret it, not--" He looked around the crowds of people. Not a single curious face turned their way, but Bill had to be careful anyhow. He didn't care about his own, but Tom's reputation was on the line.

He lowered his voice and finished quietly, "I don't regret any of it, Tom. You said you'd make it good and you did."

"Oh," Tom uttered, turning a stupefied look on Bill. "I thought you said you weren't going to say sorry because...you weren't sorry about, uh...uh, not doing it anymore." The lobes of his ears were red.

Bill wondered if it was the cold. "No!" he exclaimed, and sidled close to Tom to hip-check him. "Don't be so dense, Tom. I...damn it, that's not what I meant."

Tom jerked away. "You should be a bit more careful about what you say, then," he muttered. He shuffled forward a few steps, keeping pace with the line.

Bill sucked in a breath. Tom thought...Tom had thought he refused to apologize for ending their...whatever it was they'd had. "Well, don't I feel like shit now," he mumbled under his breath, far too softly for anyone, even Tom, to hear. Then he remembered Ariel, his spine stiffened, and he hurried to catch up his place in line.

He'd settled for pizza because he had wanted to keep talking with Tom, but he was getting sick of pizza for more reasons than painful association. For someone who ate such a large amount of junk food, Bill had his odd spots of picky eating, and too much of one type in a short amount of time was one of those. Joining any other line would set him back by too great of an amount of time, though, so he stuck with it and got his pepperoni and cheese and turned from the pick-up counter to find Tom waiting.

"Too rainy to eat outside at our usual," Tom said.

Bill nodded and grimaced around the crowded underground cafeteria space. He was feeling antisocial and didn't want to rub elbows with a bunch of people.

"There," Tom said, gesturing with his chin. "A table just opened up."

They settled at the table and Bill sipped at his drink, cudgeling his sluggish brain for topics not controversial. Andreas and his whereabouts were out - Bill wasn't feeling particularly charitable, himself, toward their friend at the moment. He was certain that the knowledge of Ariel was what Andreas had "had" over Tom, and that pissed him off about three different ways. He and Tom didn't have any classes together today, so comp lit was out.

"What about getting a tutor?" Bill asked again.

Tom raised his head, pausing in the act of rolling his slice of pizza into a tube. "I really don't want to talk about it right now, Bill," he said with a weary look. "Okay? How's your entry for the Lehardt Award competition coming along?"

Bill looked down at his own plateful. He wasn't hungry, though he couldn't quite remember eating breakfast, again. He was raw and hollow and exhausted, and there were no words in him right now that would fit together in pretty configurations, joining up into lyric patterns that he could use.

"It's not," he replied.

"Bill," Tom said. He reached up to tug at that one loose dreadlock. "Isn't the competition coming up soon?"

Now Bill was the one who wanted to change the subject. "Yeah," he said. "It's no good; I don't have the time, I definitely am lacking the inspiration, and there's no way I'll find an accompanist I want to work with before then."

"That's a lot of obstacles," Tom observed.

"Yeah." Bill palmed his bangs out of his eyes and started in on his pizza anyhow. It tasted like cardboard but he knew he'd end up choking it down with Tom watching.

"You sure you aren't putting some of those up on your own, making things harder for yourself?" Tom prodded.

Bill glared at his pizza for a moment. "Oh, you're totally right; why didn't I think of that? You've got it, I should totally force inspiration and turn out a song that sucks in order to enter myself into a competition that I'll lose because I forced it. That sounds great."

Tom set down his pizza crust. "You don't have to be bitchy about it, Bill," he said, sounding injured. "I'm just trying to point out--"

"I know," Bill said with a sigh, and held up his hand. "But...don't. I can't right now, okay? I just can't. I'm too much of a perfectionist to throw together a half-assed effort if I don't have it in me, and...I don't."

Tom nodded, not looking up from his food.

"Bill," he said after a moment. "How long have you liked him?"

Bill said up straighter, as though someone had poked him to realign his posture. "Um," he said, taken off guard. It was on the tip of his tongue to blurt, _Georg?_ and he wondered all of a sudden if Tom had seen Georg walking him to the doors at the back of the building. "The...the person I like?" He didn't want to lie, and he didn't like Georg that way, so he had to slip in the dodge.

"Yeah," Tom said, wadding up his other piece of pizza.

"A long time," Bill said softly, looking down at his own pizza. In addition to tasting like cardboard, now it was looking like blotchy, greasy cardboard to his unenthusiastic eyes.

"Oh," Tom said, and Bill had to look up at that stricken sound. Tom looked as though Bill had punched him. "Did you--"

"How about you and Ariel?" Bill interrupted, impatient with Tom's line of questioning. If Tom was upset that Bill had kept his crush from him while they'd been doing...while they'd been involved, then he wanted to make it clear that he knew Tom didn't have a whole lot of high ground to stand on. "With the two of you dating, now, things must be going pretty well."

"What!?" Tom half-shouted. His seat scraped back and all at once his eyes were blazing, hot enough that Bill drew back defensively from his side of the table. "Who...who the fuck told you that?"

"Andreas," Bill gave up his friend without a whimper. Maybe part of him kind of wanted Tom to make Andreas suffer, backward as it was. Andreas had told Bill something he didn't want to hear, hard as the truth had been.

Tom's jaw was tight and he sat in his chair for a moment, neck tendons bulging. He wouldn't look at Bill but his fists were clenched so hard that his knuckles split white over the tops.

"So," Bill pressed, residual anger making him bold but there was a fair bit of curiosity, as well. "You and Ariel, huh? I guess...it really is true." Why was he disappointed? Maybe deep down, he'd been hoping Tom would deny it again, and convince him that it wasn't true. It was pointless; even if Tom could manage to convince him, it wasn't going to end in a happy bedroom romp this time.

Tom grimaced. His eyes scanned the cafeteria and he looked murderous. "Don't want to talk about it," he said darkly. “I don't even want to hear her name.”

Bill bit his lip. "You should have told me about her, Tom." He wanted to excuse himself and leave, but it was too early for his class. He should try to choke down the pizza, at least. It was probably still raining outside. His disjointed reasons couldn't lead him away from the relevant conclusion.

He wanted to see what Tom had to say for himself.

"You're right, I should have," Tom said at last. His fists flexed on the table. "But it's not; I mean, it wasn't... You know what? Forget it. It doesn't matter anymore."

Bill's nostrils flared. He was hurt. Did Tom really think it didn't matter that he'd lied? "So is she turning into the clingy type?" he forced himself to tease. "I didn't ever think I'd see you date a girl after you...you know." _Fucked them. Knocked them out._

Tom shrugged. "Maybe I figured...I'd try something new." He glanced at Bill, then away. "But new things don't always work out. Anyhow, that's it. It's not...it is what it is. I don't think I can believe in love."

Bill was nodding before he realized. "Yeah...yeah, I..." He bent his attention to his cooling pizza and grabbed a napkin instead, beginning to tear it to bits. He wanted to hunch over and hug himself but he wasn't going to collapse; not in front of Tom.

"I have to go," Tom said abruptly. "I...I'll see you, okay, Bill?"

Bill nodded without looking up.

Tom stood beside the table for a moment as though waiting for something, someone, then he moved off abruptly.

Bill looked up and watched Tom's back recede through the crowded cafeteria, moving away from him. He kept his eyes on his friend until Tom was gone, then he sighed. He picked up one of his extra napkins and blotted it unenthusiastically over his greasy slice of pizza, then gave up the job at last. He wasn't going to eat it. At the most, he'd pick cheese off and get an unhealthy amount of grease under his manicure.

He checked his phone for the time and wondered whether it was still raining. He spent his next five minutes downloading a weather app for his phone simply to check on that fact, then finally decided he'd wasted enough time and he might as well get to his last class of the day a little bit early. It wouldn't kill him to try, yet again, to talk to other people in his class.

As he turned from shelving his tray atop one of the trash cans around the perimeter of the cafeteria, he was confronted with a smaller, curvy-petite brunette with a nice rack that Bill admired absently until he got up to her face. He scowled. Ariel was standing before him, not carrying a tray of her own so she must have come for him. Her flipped-up bob was frizzing with humidity and tucked mostly under a knitted cap today.

"What do you want?" Bill asked bluntly, folding his arms over his chest and raising a brow.

"You're Tom's best friend, right?" Ariel asked him, and there was a poisonous sweetness to her voice that carried an underlying hard edge. "Bill?"

"Yeah, that's me," Bill confirmed, not bothering to get into the mechanics of whether he or Andreas were tied for the designation or whether he was even in the running at all, given present circumstances.

"Just so you know," Ariel blustered, her eyes narrowed and her neck flushing with pebbled goosebumps, "Tom yells out your name when he's in the middle of fucking." She folded her arms and stared up at him as though she expected him to wither on the spot at her revelation.

Bill widened his eyes at her, a cold pissed-off sense of purpose creeping over him. "So? He does the same thing when he's fucking me. Good thing, huh." He gave her a contemptuous once-over from the top of her heathery-purple knitted cap to the toes of her scuffed black Mary Janes. "By the way, you realize we're in college now, right? Try reading Cosmo instead of Seventeen for those fashion tips."

Her face worked and Bill turned his back on her. He didn't feel better as he strode out of the student union, but he sure as hell didn't feel worse.

An unasked-for exultation began to build up within Bill as he sang his heart out during his music workshop. Every ending held the seeds of a beginning, the means to flourish and keep growing. It was autumn, but the light would come back and flowers would bloom again some day.

The umbrella that Georg had loaned Bill hung damply over his arm, unneeded, as he returned to the outdoors. The clouds had opened up and the sky was blue again, not the faded watery light of day but a deep blue, the shade that only reminded Bill of one thing now. Curled up in the gem-tone blue of Tom's sheets he'd never had a haven, there had never been certainty, but he'd had something. Being with Tom, leaving Tom, loving Tom. He couldn't get past it, he couldn't move on, until he got the love out of him and there was no way to do that. He could begin to try, though, by pouring it into a song.

Bill thought he had the words, now.

He dug his phone out of his handbag and dialed Georg's number.

"Hey," he said to Georg's enthusiastic 'hey, Bill.' "I'm going to need a rain check tonight. No, it's not a bad joke...seriously, we'll go out later this week. Uh-huh...no, it's a good reason."

He cupped his phone and admired the new-hanging first star of evening. "I have to write," he told Georg, knowing he'd understand. "There's a song I've got to get out."

Bill didn't believe in wishing on stars, but he had a firm hope.


	15. Chapter 15

"All right, you've been putting me off all week," Georg said, dropping into the chair beside Bill and ruffling his hair in passing. "You'd better have something good to show for it."

Bill leaned his cheek against his hand and gave him a slow-unfurling smile. "Not ditching you," he objected. "I've had to give all of my spare time and brain matter to my new baby, that's all."

Georg clutched at his heart and gave him dramatic eyes. "Somehow I don't think that's a pet name for me."

Bill merely laughed.

It had been three days since he'd watched the clouds break open and give him light again, and working on the fledgling song had given Bill a sense of peace, or at least equilibrium. He barely remembered the turn of the days or what he'd done besides stumble through the motions of everything else but here it was, Friday, and he was ready to face the weekend no matter what it threw at him.

Georg leaned over, glossy copper-brown hair sweeping over the arm that he'd propped on the desk. "Bill? If you don't want to come to the live show tonight, can I steal you for a bit after class?"

Bill bit his lip, looking up from silencing his phone, then he nodded, not seeing any harm in the suggestion. He had the most recent arrangement of his song stuffed in his backpack, and he'd been hoping to get Georg's opinion on it anyhow. If he went along with Georg, he might get the opportunity.

Class stretched out before him like an eon that afternoon. Bill shifted in his chair every minute or so, watching seconds make their slow drag across the clock face behind the teacher's head. He watched the play of the intermittent sunlight over Georg's green sweater, there and gone. He couldn't keep his mind on the technique that their teacher was discussing and demonstrating with different CDs. His phone was out in his lap and he glanced at it, willing the green flash of his notification to strobe into being.

He hadn't seen Tom in days. Tom had skipped their mutual class on Wednesday and today, and Andreas had avoided answering any of Bill's questions, saying only, "You'd better ask Tom, this time. I'm not getting involved." Bill had snapped at him, "It's a little late for that," but Andreas had simply shrugged and run off after class.

Finally today Bill had texted both of them separately, asking whether they were doing pizza and movie night. He had kind of waited until the last minute, anxious to make the assumption that their lives would proceed as usual but irked that this, too, might change. It was one of the things that Bill had been most scared of, before he and Tom... That everything would change.

Now it was. Everything was falling apart.

"Yes," Bill said after class, when the rest of their classmates began to stream out of the vaulted room and he and Georg remained, packing their notebooks into their bags. Bill fiddled with his stubbornly uncooperative phone and hitched his backpack over one shoulder.

"Yes, what?" Georg prompted, giving him a puzzled but friendly smile.

"Yes, I'll go to your live show," Bill said. He dismissed the uneasy squirm in the pit of his stomach. He didn't want it to be over; his friendship with Tom was one of the most important things in his life, but if it was going to be this way...

"Great!" Georg broke into a huge grin. "I think you're really going to like it, Bill. I mean, it's jazzy rock and I don't know if that's exactly your thing-"

Bill echoed the smile weakly, wondering when the last time he'd smiled like that had been; knowing it had to do with Tom, without question. "It's music," he responded. "I like everything but rap and country, really. Oh, and gospel. And that new age elevator music...well, and enka...and..."

"Got it," Georg said, raising a hand to stop the flow of Bill's babbling. "Hopefully you'll have a good time."

Bill nodded and juggled his things on the way out the door, getting a hand on his phone and going into his settings to unsilence it. There was a new notification.

A text from Tom.

"You okay?" Georg asked with sudden concern.

"Huh? Oh, yeah..." Bill said, pulling in a breath as he opened the text.

_andi got called in to work 2nite. u dont have to come to pizza n movie night if u dont want to._

Bill stared at the phone in his hand for a long time.

"Hey." A light touch at his elbow roused Bill from his dazed sort of introspection. "Bill, you sure you're okay?"

"Um," Bill vacillated, turning his screen off. He couldn't deal with it right now, not even for a return text. It made him feel even more like shit, as though he were abandoning Tom, then he groaned inwardly and reminded himself that, if anything, Tom had abandoned him first. He shook himself, then worked hard to give Georg a smile. "So what are we doing?"

Georg gave him a quizzical smile, shaking his head a little and releasing Bill's elbow. "I've got to make a phone call, think you can keep yourself busy for a minute?"

"Of course," Bill replied, gesturing expansively with his handbag to the windows beyond the classroom. Already the sun was low-hung, spreading color out across the horizon with its descent. "I'll be outside. We've got a beautiful day, for about five minutes." The southwest had been sending a threatening storm-cloud in their direction for the entire afternoon, but it had remained at bay so far.

"All right, see you soon."

Outside, Bill leaned against the stone ledge that flanked the building staircase. The scent of leafsmoke was strong on the air again, and he found himself wishing for a cigarette. That led to thinking of Tom, as everything inevitably led to Tom, and he cursed himself for the sudden sharp nicotine craving. He'd given it up while he lived in the dorms, because the smokers that clustered outside the dorms had put him off, giving the habit a tacky and desperate air and stripping it of any perceived glamor for him. The drag of the cigarette that had hung from Tom's lips had rekindled the old urge.

Bill pulled his phone out of his bag and eyed that most recent text furtively. He didn't even know what he wanted to say in response. He'd promised his evening to Georg, making his own plans when it seemed that his friends weren't going to come through for the evening. Maybe part of him was hoping that the longer he looked at it, the stabbing pain in his chest would lessen that much more. He could take the easy way out, and pretend he hadn't gotten the text until later.

Annoyed at himself, Bill dropped his phone in his bag again and looked up with the semblance of a bright smile when Georg came down the stairs.

"Hey!" he greeted the senior, giving him a little wave as though they'd been separated for longer than a few minutes.

"Everything's set," Georg told him with an enigmatic eyebrow-raise.

"Ooh, cryptic," Bill said, patting his hands together in a few quick little claps. "So where are we going?"

"Not telling," Georg said with a laugh. "It's on the other side of campus; are you up for a walk?"

Bill nodded, pushing himself up from the stone ledge. He tapped the chunky heel of one boot against the base of the stairs behind him. "Yeah, as long as we won't be running any marathons." He winced. Tom ran a marathon every spring, a 10K relay – Bill had gone along with to cheer him on earlier that year, and keep him well supplied with water.

All paths led back to Tom.

"None planned here," Georg responded.

For a moment as he moved to join Bill at the bottom of the stairs, Bill thought that Georg would offer his arm and he'd have to refuse, but Georg simply ran a hand through his hair, flipping it back over one shoulder. He gave him another friendly grin and stuck his hands in his windbreaker pockets.

"After you," Bill gestured. He was trying to pinpoint the source of his unease, a constant niggling sense that something was wrong. He dismissed it. They hadn't even done anything yet, after all; and Bill didn't have any commitments, Tom or otherwise.

They walked around the perimeter of campus, trudging through leaf pile-ups that had yet to be swept up and bagged. It wasn't late yet and there were still plenty of students out and about. Bill's last class was relatively early and there were enough people packing the sidewalk that he and Georg had to jostle for places as they pressed on through the crowds.

As they made the turn that would take them along the major southern walk of campus, Bill caught sight of a pair of guys walking further up the sidewalk, a petite blond and a taller, dark-haired young man, both vaguely recognizable in that way that Bill knew they'd been in a class or group activity with him at some point. They were holding hands, laughing and giving one another looks that were more warming than friendly, hot enough to keep on a cold day. Bill's stomach lurched.

"Bill?" Georg said softly beside him.

"Yeah," Bill replied, stiff, and became aware that he was clenching his hands hard enough to dig crescents into his palms. It shouldn't matter. It wasn't him.

Tom had looked at him that way, hadn't he? Bill couldn't have imagined it.

He wanted to ask Georg about love, again, but before he could open his mouth he realized it might be unfair. If Georg thought that he meant _him_ , well... Bill had never seen Tom in love, but all of a sudden he wanted more than anything to know what it looked like. How he would act; who he would tell.

With a jolt, he recalled the look on Tom's face from the other day. _I don't think I can believe in love._ Had Ariel done that to him? Or...

"We don't have to do this, you know," Georg said beside him.

Bill pulled himself into the present with an effort. "No, I want to," he claimed. He'd already said that he wanted to, after all, and it wouldn't be fair to Georg if he bailed out now. Especially with Tom cancelling pizza and movie night; what would Bill do – go home and brood? Work on his homework? He contained a snort for Georg's sake.

"You don't seem as though you're entirely with me," Georg observed.

Bill sighed. "I know, I'm sorry..."

"Oh, there's no need to apologize!" Georg assured him quickly. "I understand; Bill, I totally do. That's why...if there's someplace you'd rather be, you know...you should be there."

"No," Bill said after a moment, as they continued to walk along the pavement, closer together now even though there was more space and less students as the sidewalk emptied for classes. "I don't...there isn't any other place for me to be, just now." He bit his lip and thought of the phone in his handbag. Tom hadn't told him not to come over – only that he didn't have to if he didn't want to.

"All right," Georg said with a satisfied nod. "Well, this is the point of no return, so you know."

Bill widened his eyes at him. "How so?" he asked, looking around the leaf-strewn sidewalk and yellowing swathes of grass to either side of them. There was no date spot nearby; no coffee shop closer than three blocks, and it was mostly school buildings in that quarter of campus.

Georg gave him a very serious look. "I'm going to have to blindfold you for this part."

"No way," Bill protested, holding up both hands. "I don't...I can't..."

"Don't trust me?" Georg filled in, with a half-smirk.

"No, you'll mess up my hair," Bill whined.

Georg outright laughed. "Come on, I'll be careful," he wheedled. "Half the fun is the surprise, Bill, I promise."

Bill furrowed his brows and looked this way and that again; he truly didn't see anything unusual nearby. Not even any scenic spots, although the field to their right was kind of pretty; it was a still-undeveloped area in the midst of campus. "Um, I guess...?"

"Thanks for such heartfelt agreement," Georg said, holding up his black and gray checked cashmere scarf for Bill's inspection.

Bill nodded for him to go ahead, then held still as Georg wrapped it securely over his eyes a couple of times. He tied the knot off with care, fingers brushing at the hair to one side of Bill's neck and tickling him, making him shiver. A waft of air stirred in front of his face, probably Georg waving a hand to check his reactions, but the only thing before Bill was darkness.

"Okay," Georg said at last, and grasped Bill's upper arm.

All Bill could feel was relief that Georg hadn't grasped his hand or circled his wrist with strong fingers, and he bit his lip again as they lurched into action. Bill had to find his feet and Georg chuckled as he steadied him.

"I'm not liking this," he warned Georg.

"I know, I know. We're almost there." Georg sounded amused, but also anticipatory.

Bill counted steps as they moved forward. Fifty, as he held himself to the pace at which Georg guided him, then they made a right-hand turn. Fifteen more steps, and Georg was murmuring to someone nearby.

"...set up?"

"Yes, it's already going. Door's unlocked," said a very quiet, almost familiar monotone.

"Great. Thank you, Gus," Georg said.

Bill's mouth rounded to ask a question, but he went where he was led as Georg tugged him forward again, slowing as he put himself ahead of Bill.

"Okay, now there's a step here...feel out for it with your...good, you've got it," Georg said encouragingly. "And one more, a little higher than the first. We're going through a door now."

"This better be worth the build-up," Bill muttered, knowing that it sounded irritable but he was uncomfortable. It wasn't the surprise factor; more the blindfold. He didn't have any phobias, but Bill was pretty sure that he did have trust issues.

"Don't worry, I'm pretty sure you'll like this," Georg said, sounding excited now. There was the creak of a door swinging, then the soft click of it shutting.

Bill's breath sped and he would have held his hands out before him, if not for the grip that Georg still had on his upper arm. Georg shifted, moving around him and skimming his hand up to Bill's shoulder, then untying the blindfold and unraveling it.

For a moment Bill stood stunned in the darkness, looking around as his mouth fell open. A soft gasp escaped as he tipped his head up. Against the velvet backdrop of dark all around them, pinpricks of light shone overhead. Bill turned slowly, stumbling and steadying himself against Georg as the room seemed to revolve even though he was the only body in motion. He picked out Orion, the Big Dipper, Cassiopeia – basically the only three that he could identify.

"It's the stars," he said wonderingly.

"Yep," Georg said, letting go of his shoulder and sounding smug.

"Where are we?" Bill said, mystified. The room was too dark for him to pick out his surroundings; the only things he could make out were the stars above, and the shadowy hulk of some giant apparatus in the center of the room.

"The school observatory," Georg said nonchalantly. "Gus is an astronomy major, and he let us in here while the ceiling was turned on."

"It's beautiful!" Bill exclaimed, spinning with more surety and tipping his head back. Even on the crispest, most clear nights it was difficult to see the stars so large and bright while living in town. He looked up, seeking out one large, low-hanging star. "Is that one the North Star?"

Georg laughed. "Everyone mistakes her for that one, but it's actually Venus," he said, leaning in close beside Bill. His hair brushed against his shoulder, bringing with it that same freshly-washed scent, shampoo and whatever product he used before straightening it. He put his hand to the flat of Bill's shoulder blade and extended his other arm, turning Bill gently and directing his gaze to another, higher star that was much brighter. "There's the North Star."

"Oh, it's..." Bill began, turning and finding Georg's face so close to his, right beside him and illuminated in the dusky light of the scattered multitude of stars. It was pretend, Bill thought with a sudden start. Both the stars projected above him, and standing here with Georg.

Something flickered in Georg's eyes and he leaned in, closing the remaining distance between them.

He pressed his lips to Bill's. It was slow, a sweet and attentive kiss. When he moved closer, lifting his hand as though to cup the side of Bill's face and deepen the kiss, Bill stepped away at last with a small, wordless exclamation.

"I'm, I'm sorry," Bill stammered, wiping at his mouth with the back of one wrist. "Georg, I..."

"It's no good," Georg said with a nod.

"No, I...well...I'm sorry," Bill said, flustered. "You're so nice; you're such a good guy...it's just..."

"I'm not the one that you want," Georg supplied. "Bill, it's okay." He walked away, and for a moment Bill thought he was being left in the darkness until a switch was flipped and the room lightened by dim increments that didn't strain his eyes.

Bill stuffed a knuckle in his mouth. He wasn't going to cry, but the sympathy in Georg's voice was too much for him; he hated it. He wanted to ask why Georg had kissed him.

He thought maybe it had been to prove a point.

"Can you look at something for me, Georg?" Bill said at last, as the stars dwindled above while the floor lights brightened. "I...I finished my song, you know. I wanted someone to take a look at it, and I thought...well, I thought you'd understand."

"I'd be honored," Georg said with an easy smile.

Bill tried to return it, but was all too aware that his faltered around the edges.

They returned to the out of doors and the windswept walkway. Gustav was waiting outside, leaning against a tree with one hand in his pocket, the other holding a book upraised close enough to peruse. He had his head tucked low and white earbuds on. As they passed, he gave them a nod and shuffled past them toward the observatory as Georg waved and thanked him.

"Thank you," Bill echoed, incredibly touched that Georg would go to such lengths. It was the sort of thing, he realized, that he would have taken for a romantic gesture if it had come from someone else, someone that he regarded that way. Someone that his rebellious middle acknowledged.

Someone like Tom, exactly and only Tom.

He sighed and pushed a hand up into his bangs, tugging at them, mussing them over his face somewhat. They walked until they found an unoccupied bench, and Georg kept his hands in his pockets.

"Looks like rain," Georg observed, squinting at the sky.

"Damn it," Bill said, shading his eyes and giving the approaching thunderhead a baleful glare. In the distance, it was streaked with purple and faint flickers of light that presaged a hard storm, the likes of which they'd seen the other day.

"So, you've got it with you?" Georg prompted.

"Oh, yeah..." Bill rummaged in his things, pulling out the loose sheets on musical scoring. He'd done the arrangement, though he still wasn't quite happy with it – it was a draft, so far as he was concerned. Still rough, especially the melody, but raw with emotion.

He sat and watched Georg's face anxiously after he passed it over. Georg's brow creased and his chin began to move up and down to the tune of an inner beat. His lips moved faintly.

"Bill, this is..." Georg said at last, trailing off and looking up at him with a look that was either faintly impressed or searching for the least unpleasant verbal method of telling Bill it sucked rancid donkey balls.

"Oh, God, is it that bad?" Bill groaned, when the pause had extended for too long.

"It's amazing," Georg said quietly. "Really, this is...it's obviously a heartfelt song. You really love him, don't you?"

"I do," Bill admitted. He could be happy just being Tom's friend now, even knowing the taste of his skin, the way his arms fit around Bill. Just having been a part of that was enough for him, if only Tom would let him be around him.

If only Bill would let himself.

"Then you should tell him," Georg suggested.

"I can't!" Bill said immediately, pulling a face. "No way. He doesn't feel the way I do."

"Why don't you sing him that song and let him decide?" Georg said, quirking an unreadable look on him. "Besides, if you love him that much, you should tell him. That kind of love...it's not the kind of thing you should ever hide."

"Tell him so I can get it out there in the open and finally move on," Bill said, sucking in a wistful sigh. "Yeah, maybe you're right." He didn't want to end their friendship, but he didn't want to keep feeling like this forever, stuck in this hopeless love.

Georg handed the sheet music back over and Bill tucked it back in his backpack, giving the stormcloud a distrustful look.

"I'd better get going," he decided. "I'm going to get soaked even if I make a run for the bus, at this rate."

"Ah, ah," Georg said. "No marathons, remember?"

Bill snorted as they both rose from the bench. "Not likely in these heels," he said, turning a foot to display the side of his shoes.

"That's got to be some kind of crime," Georg protested, looking up at Bill as he straightened and did a dust-off to check his bottom for leaves. "As tall as you are, wearing heels to make yourself even taller."

"Oh, just because you're a hobbit..." Bill said, wrinkling his nose and sticking his tongue out at Georg.

"So...you're probably not coming to the live show tonight," Georg observed.

Bill winced.

"It's okay," Georg said again. "Some time, though? Bring a date." He winked, making Bill flush.

"God, if I can ever get a date again, hung up as I am," he muttered, and looked over his shoulder as the biggest grey thunderhead roiled ever closer. He was going to get wet; he could all but feel the first edge of raindrops along his exposed face and neck.

"Here," Georg said, extracting something from his backpack and pressing his big navy umbrella on Bill again.

"No, I can't," Bill protested. He was already too beholden to Georg. "You've been so..."

"It's all right," Georg insisted, tapping the handle against Bill's hand. "I'll go share with Gus. He'll drive me to our live, so...it's fine. Seriously, Bill."

"Okay," Bill said, and grabbed it, giving Georg a brilliant smile. "Thank you, Georg. For everything. I can't really repay you, but..."

"You don't need to repay _me_ ," Georg said with a stern look. "You sing him that song, Bill. That's what I think you should do."

Bill nodded, inhaling slowly. That was the one thing he didn't think he _could_ do, but Georg was asking, so... "I'll think about it," he promised.

He didn't run for the bus stop, because given the piles of slippery leaves breaking an ankle was a very real possibility, but he didn't loiter either. He set a brisk pace and made it to the bus stop as one was pulling up to the curb. He checked his phone, stone-cold and silent, and as he braced a hand against the railing to climb aboard he realized it was the Blue line, not the one that would take him to his own studio apartment.

He climbed aboard anyhow.

Bill jittered in his seat as the bus rumbled its slow path along the streets. As he watched the scenery crawl past, the light dimmed and a gust pattered the first spray of rain along the windows and sides of the bus like an assault. The rain hit the windows in an increasingly steady, dismal rattle and Bill clenched his thighs together, gripping his borrowed umbrella with both hands. He pulled his phone out and checked it again. He composed and abandoned texts in his head. It was entirely possible Tom wasn't even home; like Bill, he might have made other plans after not hearing from him for so long.

Bill peered out through the gloom and frowned, and fretted. His brows slanted sharply together and he yelled out, "Stop!" before he realized, lurching to his feet and nearly going down as an ankle turned under him. He fell against the side of the bus and yanked at the dangling stop-cord. He grabbed his things and made a beeline for the door before the bus had even groaned to a halt beside the curb.

He had Georg's umbrella out and extended over him, but it slowed him down. "Shit," he groaned, as the shuffling figure in the distance grew even further, and the grey of the rain shrouded everything. He would never catch up at this rate.

Bill puffed, and began to jog. The rising wind fought him for possession of the umbrella. He ran harder and found himself wrestling with his umbrella, and the backpack over his shoulder, and it slowed him up – he was losing Tom.

He cursed and let go.

Georg's umbrella spun out behind him, splashing down into a newly-formed puddle as Bill pelted up the sidewalk, running faster than he'd ever thought possible with clunky heels, and he was making headway at last. Bill spurred himself on, arms pumping and rain slapping him in the face, plastering his hair against his cold skin.

It was definitely Tom, trudging up the block with his head down and his hands in his pockets.

"Tom!" Bill yelled.

Tom pivoted, slipped and almost fell, and stood motionless on the sidewalk, squinting. A dawning hope was visible as Bill closed the distance.

Bill ran, winded in the last stretch but working hard to get there as Tom stayed in place, waiting in the pouring rain for him. For a moment, Bill wasn't sure if he was going to deck Tom or collide right into him and grab him for support.

Tom opened his arms, either floundering in place or extending them for Bill, and that made his mind up at the last instant.

Bill hurtled into Tom's arms with enough force to drive him back several paces.

"Oof," Tom grunted, as Bill ran into him.

"Tom," Bill said against his ear, and pressed his face against Tom's wet neck. He didn't care anymore; there was no place he'd rather be.

"You're cold," Tom said against his ear, shivering. "Let's get you someplace warm and dry, okay?"

"Okay," Bill agreed. His teeth were chattering and he wormed an arm around Tom to make sure he wouldn't be let go.

Tom kept an arm around his shoulders as they hurried up the last leg of block to his apartment.

"Is this really okay?" Tom asked him, peering into Bill's face as he dropped a towel over his head in the entryway. "You have a boyfriend now. Won't it be trouble for you if he knew you were here?"

Bill gave a half-crazed little sob that thankfully sounded more like a hiccup. "Shut up, Tom," he said, hitting him in the shoulder. "It's movie and pizza night with my best friend, you know?"

Tom bit his lip as though to prevent the smile that tugged his mouth upward.

"So, Andreas isn't home tonight?" Bill said, rubbing at his own arms as Tom toweled Bill's head off, a big one draped over his own dripping dreadlocks in a makeshift turban.

Tom shook his head, dark eyes intent on Bill's like a question unsaid.

"Take me to bed..." Bill began, stepping in close to Tom and moving to grab his over-large shirt, to bunch it in his hands. He shook his head as Tom dropped the towel around Bill's shoulders, rocking back on his heels as his expression transformed with shock. "Wait, about you and Ariel--"

"There is no 'me and Ariel,'" Tom interrupted. "I fucked her once, weeks ago. That was it."

Bill flushed. "But she told me that you..."

"Dated her?" Tom said angrily. "Yeah, but did she tell you--" 

"...called out my name during sex."

Tom groaned, palming his forehead. "Yeah, the _one time_ we did it, before you and I ever..."

"But you were dating her!" Bill said indignantly, still stuck on that. "You were dating her, while you and I--"

"I wasn't fucking her!" Tom said, casting his hands up in the air. He began to dig a hand around his voluminous jeans. "You want to call her? Seriously, Bill. She'll tell you. She was pissed off enough about it; she could force me to date her, but not fuck her--"

"Oh," Bill said, eyes going round. "Oh, oh." _That_ made sense now, together with the way Ariel had approached him the other day and spat the news of Tom's orgasmic salutation to him as though it should freak him out, as though it were something Ariel had been holding over Tom.

He pulled in a wondering breath, curiously light and free and giving Tom a smile, a real smile, as he closed in on him again and let himself do what he wanted to. He grabbed Tom's shirt and reeled him in. "But, you were dating..."

"I don't want to get into that right now," Tom said, gathering Bill into his arms and stroking over Bill's back, over his ass, up over his waist and down his hips and around to his ass again. "Please, not right now. I only want to think about you. I only want to touch you."

"It really was only me?" Bill murmured.

"Yeah," Tom breathed against his mouth. "I haven't had sex with anyone but you for weeks. Ever since the first time. God, want to touch you so bad."

"Touch me," Bill invited, grabbing Tom's hand and pushing it up his shirt.

Tom's eyes darkened and he hovered near Bill's face for a moment before ridding them of unwanted distance, pressing his lips over Bill's.

Bill smiled against his mouth before opening his lips to Tom. Their tongues touched, tentative at first then seeking, and Tom's nudged against his before tickling around the head of his tongue stud. Bill moaned into the kiss and thrilled his tongue stud against Tom's tongue.

Tom groaned and he leaned harder against Bill, pressing into him.

When they parted, Bill rested his forehead against Tom's and Tom licked his lips.

"Your boyfriend..." Tom whispered.

"One last time, okay?" Bill whispered back, aching. He couldn't let Tom go, so he held him tight for now.

It might be his imagination, but he thought Tom held him back even tighter. 

"All right," Tom said, voice shaking.


	16. Chapter 16

Tom began to strip Bill's wet clothes from him in the entryway and Bill struggled at first, not because he wasn't ready to be naked and exposed before Tom but out of some misplaced remnant of propriety. They hadn't even taken their shoes off and Bill's back was up hard against the front door as Tom's fingers sought and stroked over his stomach, his ribs, and traced over his nipples as their tongues met. Bill tried to pull away, writhing until his head thunked against the door.

"Wait," he started, breaking from Tom's mouth with a small noise of protest. "Wait, we shouldn't..." he began, uncomfortable that they were still necking against the front door, which was probably unlocked. Even if Andreas was at work all night, the thought of being walked in on left him cold.

"Bill?" Tom questioned, sounding crestfallen as he began to disentangle his hands from Bill's shirt.

"No, don't _stop_ ," Bill said, surging against him, momentum carrying him against Tom several steps back from the door. "No, I don't want to stop, just...not here, okay?" He remembered the first time that Tom had gone down on his knees for him and shuddered a little. So hot, but they'd been risking so much.

"Thank God," Tom breathed against his ear, and licked it.

"Bedroom?" Bill suggested, settling his hands at the small of Tom's back and digging into the flesh there, hooking his fingers into the waistband of Tom's boxers. "I...I want to try something..."

"Anything," Tom said fervently, kissing at Bill's jaw, then the corner of his mouth. "Anything, Bill, anything you want to do."

"Good," Bill mumbled against Tom's lips, and let himself be led into the apartment as Tom tugged at his belt – not to take it off, but to draw Bill after him.

They kissed again as they walked, Bill trusting Tom to guide him as they joined their lips again and again. Tom opened his mouth with a hungry sound as Bill stroked his tongue along Tom's lower lip. He trapped Bill's upper lip between both his, pulling a hand free of his shirt to tangle at the hair at the base of Bill's neck.

"I..." Tom shuddered and licked at Bill's lips, kissing him more deeply. "Come on, let's..." He continued to walk backward, kissing Bill hard enough that Bill wanted more, and crowded against Tom until they were stepping fast, mouths locked and kissing in a desperate frenzy.

Tom barely managed to get the door to his bedroom shut as they stumbled through it. Bill skimmed his shirt off and tossed it to the side, then he was on Tom as he pounced.

"Oh," Tom managed, thudding against the door with a look of surprise, then he was opening his mouth to Bill's again. Their tongues twined and Bill rubbed up against him, unbuckling his belt with hurried fingers and stroking over Tom's belly as he pushed his unresisting jeans down.

"So good," Bill whispered against the corner of his mouth. "So good with you, Tom; it's always so good." He pulled away and kissed Tom's chin; moved down to his throat.

"What are you..." Tom began, then groaned as Bill slid down his front, getting down on his knees and patting familiarly at the bulge in Tom's boxers. "Oh." Tom's voice was low, astounded.

Bill rubbed his cheek against Tom's boxer-clad hardness, letting his eyes flutter shut as his breathing roughened. It was so hot against his skin, even through the fabric and he did it again, panting a little. He wanted what came next more than he'd let himself realize. He stroked along Tom's tense thighs and sought out Tom's cock with his mouth, tracing the shape of it through the thin layer of cloth and pressing his lips near the tip. Moisture was already seeping through as Bill nuzzled against him there.

"Bill," Tom said, his voice small and strangled. "Are you sure about this?"

"Mm-hmm," Bill responded, stroking Tom as he drew him out of the slit in his boxers. His mouth watered at the sight of it - long, hard, and just thick enough so far as Bill was concerned. He was hungry for it; he wanted it in his mouth, he wanted Tom to put it _inside_ him, too. Not because it was the perfect cock, necessarily – though to him it was – but because it was Tom's and he needed it, loved it.

Loved Tom. Everything of Tom's.

Bill pushed the foreskin down and swiped over the head with his thumb, encouraged at the low moan that left Tom, the scrabble of Tom's fingers scratching along the door behind him for purchase. He leaned forward and licked over the wet tip of him. Bill made a considering noise, pressing his tongue against his upper lip as he tasted Tom, then he fastened his mouth over the head and swirled his tongue around, applying suction. It tasted strange, different from anything that Bill might have compared it to; there was bitter and musk and a hint of sweat but it wasn't awful.

Tom swore and jerked, one leg kicking out and thumping against the door. "Bill," he groaned, pleasure-wracked.

Bill breathed in through his nose, inhaling the scent that surrounded him, heady and basic. He pressed the ball of his tongue stud against Tom's cock, under and around the tip, pulling the most undignified noise he'd ever heard from Tom's lips.

Tom swore. His hands slid into Bill's hair.

"Bill, you're so good," Tom moaned, twisting his fingers around locks of Bill's hair. "Ahh...ahhh..."

Bill tried not to smile, pleasure stirring inside him, as well as in his groin, as he worked his lips down around Tom's length. He stroked the stud in his tongue against the underside of Tom's cock as he began to go up and down. He plied his hand over the remaining length, covering the distance from his lips to the base, hand tight as the seal of his mouth.

Tom's fingers were at his temples, the touch gentler than anything Bill had known.

As Bill quickened into a steady pace, Tom began to groan louder, shifting his hips and pushing into Bill's mouth, then retreating until he hit the door. "Stop...stop. Ahh, Bill!"

Bill wrinkled his nose at the protests, pulling off with a moist smack then returning to pull Tom's foreskin down again. He kissed the exposed head; rolled his tongue around it.

Tom grabbed a fistful of Bill's hair, gentle but firm. "Please? I don't want to come in your mouth."

"You could," Bill murmured, darting forward again to lick at the copious spill of pre-come that was now flowing from the slit. He licked until Tom was moaning again, pulling insistently at his hair.

"No, I want to...I wanna be with you, Bill," Tom told him. He sounded almost shy, now, and Bill stroked his cock with an affectionate hand, pressing a last open-mouthed kiss with a flicker of tongue to the tip before getting up.

He thought Tom might not want to kiss him, after that; but Tom hauled him close and locked his mouth over Bill's at once, kissing him harder than before, teeth denting his lip. His hands ran down Bill's back again, up and down before grasping at his butt, pressing them together. The drugged-out drag of Tom's tongue along his made Bill want to promise him anything, but if this was the last then Bill wanted it a certain way.

He wanted this on his terms.

"Want you," Tom said against his mouth, lips twitching in a smaller, secondary kiss. He rubbed his nose against Bill's; kissed him again.

"I want to do it on my hands and knees," Bill said resolutely. He couldn't bear to watch Tom's face, this time, as they did it this last time.

Tom's head knocked back against the door and he looked troubled. "But, I..."

"Please?" Bill whispered, leaning in and kissing Tom's mouth, his throat. "I want to. You said anything I want."

Tom was frowning but his hands massaged at Bill's ass, palming and squeezing him, and the way he thrust against Bill's belly was anxious. "Okay," he said at last. He moved in to kiss Bill again and Bill cooperated for a moment, then pulled away to unbuckle his own jeans, biting his lip over a sultry smile as he backed toward the bed. He shed his jeans and boxers; bent to strip off his damp socks.

With a dumbly eager expression Tom followed him, pulling his outermost shirt off, tossing it aside, then shucking off the t-shirt beneath it. He stumbled out of the rest of his clothes as Bill backed up until he bumped against Tom's bed.

Bill grinned at Tom's enthusiasm, liking the way his eyes shone as he cast aside the last of his clothing and reached for him again. He snared his fingers in Tom's damp dreadlocks and they kissed again, pressed together naked chest to chest on down. Bill was panting into Tom's mouth as their cocks met. He pushed against him with a moan, wanting to feel him that close.

No, he wanted him closer.

"Tom," Bill groaned, lifting up one leg and hooking it over Tom's hip, straining against him. "Wanna..." His hips drove wildly against Tom, sliding his cock between their bellies.

"I know," Tom said against his mouth, and kissed him. "Me too. Let's..." He loosened his grip and pressed his forehead against Bill's.

"Please, let's do it," Bill said desperately, thrusting again before he could help himself. He thought he might come before they even got anywhere but it was okay; he was certain Tom could keep fucking him until he came again. He moaned and rubbed himself against Tom's stomach.

"Yes," Tom said, lips pressing against his cheek. "God, right now, Bill, before I..."

"Yeah!" Bill agreed, with a flash of realization. He disentangled himself from Tom with one last nibble for Tom's swollen lower lip and hopped onto the bed on his hands and knees, bouncing a bit to test the springiness. He crooked a glance over his shoulder.

Tom was looking at him with those stunned eyes again, his mouth open, as though he couldn't believe that Bill was here in his bed.

Bill inhaled through his nose and faced front again, settling on his knees and grabbing the footboard. "Is this good?" he asked, wriggling his bare ass.

"Uh," Tom grunted.

Bill chanced another look. Tom was staring at him, now giving him hot-eyed appraisal that rated somewhere between overwhelmingly horny and stricken. He hesitated, then turned for his bedstand and got out the lube and a condom, tossing them to the bed.

Tom climbed onto the bed behind him, stroking Bill's hips, his ass, the skin on the backs of his thighs. He bent and pressed his open mouth to Bill's tailbone.

"Ah," Bill said, squirming a little as Tom stroked fingers into the crease of his ass and kissed his tailbone again, flicking his tongue into the dent at the base of his spine. Behind him, the sound of the lube uncapping was loud but so, so welcome. Tom kissed one of his buttocks as he parted his cheeks, then stroked one cold-slick finger against him, circling his entrance until Bill relaxed, spreading his legs a little wider. Then Tom pressed it into him, kissing Bill's rear cheek with a hint of teeth.

"Fuck," Tom muttered, sounding exhilarated. "Bill..."

"More," Bill told him. He was tight, he knew, but already enjoying the sensation of one finger moving back and forth. He wanted Tom in him soonest.

Tom grunted his response, kissing and mouthing against Bill's skin as he added another finger. He dabbled his tongue at Bill's tailbone and pressed into him firmly with his fingers, making Bill moan as he moved them in and out.

"Tom," Bill said in a breathless tone, not exactly begging. "Hurry." He reached between his thighs to squeeze his erection. He was so hard and ready.

Making a low, needy noise, Tom kissed his spine again, pulling his fingers out. "I've only done two..."

"I don't care!" Bill insisted. "I want you right now, Tom."

Tom made another noise, wiping his hand against the sheets and grabbing his hips. The hardness of his cock pressed against Bill's ass and Bill moaned, rubbing back against him. One of Tom's hands stroked over his back, lingering at the crease of his ass then sweeping back upward. "No, wait," Tom mumbled.

"Hmm?" Bill lifted his head as Tom's hands left him and his weight creaked off the bed. "Where are you going!?"

Tom came around the side of the bed and into Bill's field of vision, hurrying over to the closet across from the foot of the bed. He palmed his cock with a wince as he went. Bill stared open-mouthed at Tom's bare ass, distracted, until he realized Tom was opening his closet, pulling the door all the way open and confronting Bill with a glimpse of himself, his lust-dazed expression reflecting in the full-length mirror hung on the closet door.

"No, I don't..." Bill flushed all over and gripped the footboard in both hands. "I don't want to look at _me_ while we do it."

"Then look at me," Tom told him. His eyes were dark as he surveyed Bill arrayed on his bed. He tongued at his lip-ring, then he was headed for him with a purposeful stride, one hand still clasped around his cock. "Because I want to see you; I want to see your face."

Bill groaned, of half a mind to ask _what's so fascinating about my face?_ He looked like a drowned rat right now, his hair damp and frizzy around his face, makeup half gone and eyeliner smudged around his burning eyes. "Just get _on_ me," he entreated.

Tom was nodding; Bill could see that out of the corner of his eye, then the bed was creaking. Bill closed his eyes as the rip of the condom wrapper crinkled loud to his ears. He waited, and Tom didn't make him wait for long.

Tom stroked his hips, along his ass, then parted his cheeks and tested him with a finger.

"Tom," Bill growled, pushing back against him and clenching down on that finger.

"Fuck," Tom spat out, hastily withdrawing. "Bill, I..." He pressed against him and slid his wet cock along Bill's crack.

"Yes," Bill said, eyes flashing open on the mirror and looking at himself, startled and half-gone, then he looked up into Tom's eyes. "Yes, yes, yes..."

Tom pressed into him and Bill lurched forward, gripping the footboard harder with both hands. Tom's mouth was open and his eyes were hazy as he sank himself into Bill, steadied against his hips.

"Oh," Bill moaned, and his mouth elongated, dragging sound out of him as Tom opened him up, his cock fitting inside Bill so good. The head of his dick jolted against his prostate as Tom's hips kissed his butt. "Oh, ohh, oh my God." He dipped his head, panting. That had never happened before, especially not so fast.

Tom held himself against Bill, unmoving.

Bill's face screwed up and he braced himself, shifting to widen his stance. He arched his back, pressing his butt against Tom's already-sweaty skin, but Tom still wasn't moving and it confused him.

"Bill," Tom said, his voice so quiet it wavered.

Panting, licking his lips, Bill lifted his head. Their eyes locked. Bill was riveted in place, full of Tom. Their eyes were on one another yet Bill had never felt so distant, even with Tom so close, pressing so deep inside of him that there was nowhere left to go.

"Oh," Bill moaned again, shifting and trying to push back against Tom to encourage him to move.

Tom's fingers dug into his hips, keeping him in place. He looked lost. "Bill," he said again, his face desperate, streaked with sweat at his temples, the corners of his eyes.

"Move," Bill groaned, arching his back again.

Tom bent over him and withdrew at last, making Bill whine at the burn of his retreat, then cry out as he pushed back in. He repeated the motion slowly and Bill cried out, tightening around him already.

"Oh my God," Bill keened, shoving himself back onto Tom's cock as he began to move a little faster, establishing a delicious rhythm, good for both of them if Tom's incoherent noises were anything to judge by. Tom was rubbing against his prostate with almost every stroke. "Fuck, I...fuuuck, I don't think it's going to take much." He hung over the footboard with one arm, keeping his avid eyes fixed on Tom's lust-drunk face as he fumbled between his legs and found himself hard enough to burst. He took his hand away hastily, afraid to come too fast.

"I don't...ah, ahh!...I don't think I'm going to last long, either," Tom admitted, thrusting a little harder, a bit more insistently.

"Just keep...oh...doing it like that," Bill moaned, pushing back against Tom and tightening down around him. Through half-lidded eyes he watched Tom watching him and crooned something insensate but encouraging. Tom was hitting his prostate as he pumped Bill full of him, so much that Bill thought he'd cry from the sheer pleasure of it. He bit his lip hard.

Tom shook his head and bent double over Bill's back until dreadlocks rustled against Bill's skin. "Can't," he said, pressing his lips beside Bill's spine.

"What?" Bill gasped, a sudden fear slicing through his building readiness.

"Come here," Tom told him, one arm going around him. He pressed a hand flat against Bill's stomach.

Bill moaned, struggling a little and trying to pump his hips back against him, but Tom had all of the leverage. Tom's other arm went around him, pulling Bill upright against him, draping him open over Tom's thighs and it made him so incredibly full, so close to Tom and loved, if possible; more loved and cared-for than at any point in his life with both of Tom's arms around him now and Tom's lips set against his neck.

Tom was pressed full-length behind him and stroking his hip, his belly, then his cock. His other hand traveled up Bill's sweaty chest and caressed Bill's neck, then he turned Bill's face to kiss him. Their tongues touched and Tom shuddered, thrusting up into him gently.

Bill cried out hoarsely into Tom's mouth as he came. He was so close to it; the 'I love you' was crowding out every other thought but his mouth was occupied and he kissed Tom harder as he jutted his hips forward, spilling his sticky release in bursts over Tom's insistently-moving hand.

"Bill," Tom said in his ear, low-voiced, and kissed it. "Bill, Bill, Biiiillll..." He turned his name into a drawn-out moan as he pushed his cock up hard into Bill and then held himself there, his hips meeting Bill's ass in shallow pulses.

Bill liked the way Tom said his name, just then.

"Tom," he murmured, coming back to awareness of himself as a separate entity as Tom stroked his face, down his sides, and petted his oversensitive cock gently. Bill wanted to say it so badly. He almost thought he could. He looked in the mirror at Tom bent over his neck, still nuzzling his skin, and bit his lip hard enough to hurt.

"Was that good?" Tom mumbled, his lips vibrating against Bill's neck.

"Yeah," Bill assured him. "So good."

Tom tugged him down onto his side on the bedspread, putting an arm and a leg over him without bothering to disengage their bodies.

"Tom," Bill whispered, squirming a little uncomfortably.

"Stay," Tom whispered, clearly drifting into sleep. His lips twitched against the back of Bill's neck and one hand inscribed lazy circles over Bill's stomach above his navel.

"Okay," Bill mumbled back. "Okay."

Tom snuggled against him, pressing into him a little more deeply until Bill moaned, not sure if he was turned on or awkwardly uncomfortable, then Tom began to pull out. Bill winced and whined protest, though he knew it would be better now rather than later.

He'd miss it. Miss this; their connection, being this close to Tom.

After Tom knotted the condom off and got it safely out of the way, he returned to Bill and draped himself over him until Bill thought he might smother, but he wanted that too. He wanted everything that Tom was willing to give him. He fell into a doze as Tom breathed against the back of his neck, then before he knew it, he was out.

Bill sat up with a jolt and looked around wildly in the near-darkness of a gloomy bedroom, disoriented for a moment. "What...where..." He looked down and his expression softened as he realized he was looking down at Tom's sleeping face. Tom was on his side, dreads fanned out behind him, one hand tucked under his chin. He looked peaceful and younger than their nineteen years as Bill admired him in the fading light.

He stroked Tom's cheek. The words were on the tip of his tongue, the weight of love unsaid. He bent to kiss Tom's cheek and carefully, oh so carefully, disentangled himself from Tom's grasp and the clinging dark of blue sheets around his waist and legs.

The song was welling up in his heart, its melody heavy and overwhelming, beautiful but bittersweet.

Bill grabbed his boxers and sneaked out into hallway, breathing aloud in relief when he found the rest of the apartment dark and quiet. He spent some quality time in the bathroom, splashed a little cold water over his face and wiped at the corners of his eyes with toilet paper when he couldn't find Kleenex or cotton balls, then crept back up the hallway.

"Bill?" Tom was thrashing upright in bed, sounding a little crazed. "Bill!?"

"Right here," Bill called out softly, clicking the door shut behind them. "Tom. I'm still here."

Tom's shoulders slumped and he rubbed at his face. "I thought you left," he said. "You can turn the light on."

Bill did, and eyed him shyly. Tom looked sleepy but sated, his cheeks still flush with warmth.

"I want you to play something for me," Bill said abruptly.

Tom groaned. Not a sexy sound, this time, but one of complaint. "Bill..." he half-whined. "I don't..."

"I did it. I wrote a song for the Lehardt competition," Bill told him. "And...I need an accompanist. Guitar. I want it to be you."

Tom sat up a little straighter, frowning at him. "Me? But I..."

"It has to be you," Bill said softly. "Will you...I've got it in my backpack. Will you try it out, for me?"

Tom pulled his knees up, drawing an expanse of blue sheet with him, and rubbed at his face again, grinding one fist against his eyes. "Yeah, I guess."

Bill gave him a wry grin for the lack of enthusiasm, then turned to go and fetch his sheet music.

When he returned, Tom was sitting on the window still wearing only his boxers, which was wide enough for his narrow butt. He had his guitar out and slung between his knees.

"Can you hold it up for me?" Tom requested.

"Of course."

Tom scanned it over, his lips vibrating faintly, and as he read through it he began to frown. He sucked in a breath, began to shake his head, then looked up at Bill as though imploring with him wordlessly.

"Ready?" Bill asked, ignoring that look. He breathed in deep, from the diaphragm.

Tom bit his lip and nodded.

His fingers moved tentatively over the strings, coaxing sound from the guitar that started out quietly, but strengthened as Tom read through the music Bill held out for him and his strumming grew more confident.

Bill opened his mouth and sang.

Tom played his song, and Bill sang directly to Tom.

It was love, and longing, and being wrapped up in something he couldn't let go. His song unfurled around them, giving Tom the measure of his feelings and asking nothing in return. He sang the first verse, got through the bridge, then began the chorus.

" _You showed me what it meant to become part of the blue of desire/ joining together with you in the hottest part of the fire_..."

Tom struck his hand over the strings, hitting all of them at once and producing a blurt of noise then he laid his hand on them flat, silencing the guitar. 

Bill broke off, wide-eyed.

"I can't," Tom said, looking down and shaking his head. "I just...I can't. I can't accompany you on this song, Bill."

"Why not?" Bill demanded, his heart in his throat.

"So, the guy you wrote that about...you must really love him, yeah?"

"Yes," Bill said, sidling closer to Tom. He set the sheet music down on the bedstand behind him. "I really do."

Tom rubbed his neck and set aside his guitar. "I wish you'd told me before," he said, leaning against his knees. "I never would have...if I'd known...I mean, I wouldn't have asked you to, with me..."

"You're such an idiot," Bill said fondly.

Tom's head jerked up and he glared right into Bill's face.

"It's you, Tom," Bill said outright. His chest was tight and his face was hot; it was the usual, for him. This was how Tom made him feel, and he was saying it out loud at last. He was setting it free, as Georg had urged him to. "It's always been you, okay? You're the only one I can look at. You're the only one I've been with. You're the only one I want--"

Tom leapt to his feet, a look dawning over his face that resembled horror.

Bill stumbled onward hurriedly, "I, I knew you didn't feel the same way, so I--"

Tom seized him by the arms and shoved his mouth against Bill's, shutting him up with a clash of teeth. When he pulled away, he was breathing hard and looked terrified. " _I_ love you," he blurted. His fingers bit into Bill's arms as Bill gaped over at him, speechless for once. "I love you, Bill. I should have said it before. I thought it was enough to...to show you by...by doing what we did...it was stupid, okay? I love _you._ "

"But..." Bill stared. His lips were tingling. He thought he might hyperventilate. "You and Ariel..."

Tom's face went rigid. “She was _blackmailing me_ , Bill. After I...when I said your name, during, she...well, she didn't do anything right away. But she came to me last week and told me I had two options; take her out on dates, real dates with flowers and me dressed up in a stupid suit and everything, or she'd go to my track coach and tell him I was beating off to my track mates, checking them out in the showers, stealing their...stealing their underwear; some sick shit, even worse than that, not getting into it. She did it to win some stupid bet at her sorority, I don't even know. And the track coach...fuck, he's homophobic."

Bill trembled in Tom's grip, still trying to process it. He grasped this more easily than the other...than the more momentous revelation. "The track season...didn't end," he ventured.

"No," Tom agreed. "I quit, Bill. So she wouldn't have anything to hold over my head anymore. But then you, with Georg...”

“I was never _with_ Georg,” Bill interrupted, widening his eyes at Tom's anxious face. “He was helping me out. Because I thought you didn't love me, that you were only doing it because it was good.”

Tom grinned at him, getting an arm around him and pressing their bodies close. “Well, yeah, of course it was good,” he said. “Doing it with the person you love is good, isn't it?”

"So...you love me?" Bill prodded, going back to that heady confession.

Tom ducked his head. “You going to make me say it again?” he said, abashed.

“Yes,” Bill stated definitively. "Because you should have said it earlier."

“Okay. Okay, you're right, I should have.” Tom took a breath. “I love--”

Bill surged forward, crushing Tom's mouth with his own.

Tom 'oomphed' into the kiss before returning it with interest, so enthusiastic that when his arms went around Bill, he lifted him clear off the ground.

Bill kissed him hard, grinning when he felt Tom's lips curve against his. They broke at the same time, and Tom's hand lifted to caress against his cheek, thumb plying against his cheekbone in what Bill now recognized as a loving gesture.

"Stay the night?" Tom entreated.

"Definitely," Bill purred, securing his arms around Tom's neck and rubbing his cheek beside Tom's. "You'll have trouble getting rid of me."

Tom swept him up into his arms, ignoring his squawks, and carried him to the bed as Bill kicked and clung tight to Tom's neck. "You'd better be my boyfriend, now," he informed Bill as he deposited him in the midst of his mussed blue sheets.

Bill sprawled back and stuck his tongue out, displaying the bead of his stud and making Tom's eyes darken with lust. "All you ever had to do was ask."


	17. Epilogue

Sun lapped over Bill's face, warming him, and something tickled against his cheek. He twitched his nose and cracked one eye open, ready to swat whatever fly had breached his spotless studio apartment to interrupt his sleep. A brown yarn-like strand dangled above him in the haze of golden morning light and Bill batted at it sleepily as it swept across the bridge of his nose.

"That's my brat cat," Tom drawled, twitching his dreadlock just out of reach. "Awake at last."

Bill inhaled sharply, then pressed his entire body against Tom in a luxuriant stretch. "Morning," he breathed happily, his chest swelling with euphoria. He grinned at Tom; gave him his best, most blissful grin because Tom loved him, and that made everything right with his world. "This is the first time we've slept together."

Tom wriggled his eyebrows and petted one hand down Bill's side, lingering over his hip, circling his thumb over the arch of bone. "Oh, we've slept together--"

"Asshole, you know what I mean," Bill squealed, reaching out and twisting Tom's nipple, making him oof and lurch against Bill. "You and me, together all night in your bed. Sleeping over."

"With your boyfriend," Tom added, giving Bill a smug look from close range.

"Yes," Bill said, face flaming. There was something more embarrassing about the whole thing, somehow, _because_ he knew how Tom felt about him and Bill could look back to all the little cues that would have informed him in that direction if he hadn't been so hung up on what he thought he'd known to be true. He squashed his face against Tom's pillow to hide a goofy grin. "With my boyfriend, and his morning erection."

"Well, what else d'you expect?" Tom half-whined, pushing it more firmly against Bill's hip and slinging his weight over Bill's side. "I've been lying here looking at your face, for, like, ages..."

Bill caught his breath, a pleased little smile touching his lips that almost certainly bore a strong resemblance to a cream-sated cat.

"What is it with you and my face?" he mumbled instead, lifting it off Tom's pillow and shifting until he could look him in the eye.

"You're gorgeous," Tom said immediately, then bit his lip as though to button his teeth over the grin that attempted to take over his expression.

"Ugh," Bill said, but he was definitely grinning. "Was that...so when did you know?"

Now it was Tom's turn to push his face against the pillow. "Don't make me say it," he protested, his voice muffled.

"Before we...?" Bill wanted to know, nudging Tom in the ribs. "Or after?"

One bright eye peered over at him. "I kind of figured it out, after," Tom admitted, still muffled. "This's the first time I've been in love, you know? I was – I have been – before we did it, but I only realized it after we...after our first time together. Um, kinda during, really."

"After we made love," Bill said, and it was his turn to be smug. Their first time was cast in a whole new light for him; the happiness that set him alight now was spreading back through his memories as though by osmosis, transmitting that same feeling to what he'd felt before and turning even his tears to an expression of joy. Tom had been so carefully considerate with him; he'd done so much for him, that first time and all those that had followed. Bill should have realized earlier.

"Yeah," Tom mumbled, and rose up from the pillow to spill Bill onto his back. He hovered over him, pressing him into the mattress. He ducked his head and kissed Bill's cheek, his ear; nuzzled down to bite his shoulder. "What about you?"

"What about me, what?" Bill said, lust-fogged already. Tom was atop him and moving slowly, suggestively.

"When did you first...?" Tom trailed off and he was _flushing_ , actually turning faintly red. Mostly the tips of his ears, but Bill watched him color up with fascination, as usual, that anything could embarrass Tom.

"For ages," Bill said matter-of-factly. "I mean, I've had a crush on you practically since the first day, you know. But...I realized I loved you when you asked me to have sex with you. And I was so scared, because I didn't want to have sex with someone I didn't love...and realized that wouldn't stop me in your case, because. Um. I already did. Do."

"Lucky for me," Tom said, moving a little faster now, making Bill's mouth fall open as their breath sped in tandem. "So...do you want to..."

"Want to try something a little different?" Bill filled in the blank for him, and Tom's eyes glinted.

"What did you have in mind?" Tom wanted to know. His tongue emerged to flick-flick at his tongue ring and Bill's belly turned over in a quick, eager somersault.

"You in me, without a condom?" Bill ventured.

Tom's eyes widened. "No," he said at once. "No, Bill, we can't."

Bill sucked in a breath. "At all?" he said in a small voice.

Tom frowned, looking off to one side of Bill. "I need to go get tested," he began thoughtfully, then met Bill's eyes. "You should get tested, too."

"But we've always been safe--" Bill began.

"Doesn't matter. I've always used one, every time, but if you want to...if you want to do that, Bill, we both get tested," Tom said firmly.

"Then we can do it without a condom?" Bill wondered. He'd heard, and read, that it was better without one. The reason he had asked, though, was because he felt as though it would bring him even closer to Tom, no barriers between them. They'd admitted that they loved each other, after all. That had been the greatest hurdle of all.

"No, then we wait another six months, and get tested again," Tom told him. "Then when we both test clean again, we can go bareback." He dropped a kiss on Bill's nose when Bill wrinkled it at him.

Bill pushed his lip out. "That's a long time," he complained. "But you've always been safe, right? So you should be--"

"I'm not going to risk hurting you, Bill," Tom stated, his expression resolved. "Yeah, I'm pretty sure I'm clean; yeah, I've always used protection, but you remember your basic health class, right? It's not worth the risk until we're both one hundred percent sure."

Bill nodded reluctantly, still thrusting his lip out. It was such a long time for something he knew to be a virtual certainty. "We're gonna do it," he told Tom.

Tom grinned down at him. "We're definitely going to do it," he said, dipping his hips against him lasciviously. "And I can tell you one thing for sure. We're going to have so much sex from now on, Bill."

"Oh," Bill said, groaned a little, and laced his hands over Tom's back. " _So_ much. Right now? Wait, Andi's got to be home by now; it's morning..."

"You think that's gonna stop me?" Tom asked him directly, rubbing against him. He propped himself on one arm and reached for Bill's cock. "Who cares if Andi hears us doing it? Serves him right for listening; he's got headphones."

"Nooo," Bill moaned, writhing under Tom anyhow and scratching lightly up his back.

Tom shuddered, pushing against Bill's thigh. "If you really don't want to..." he began.

"No," Bill said again, but he meant yes, and rolled his hips against Tom.

"Unh," Tom groaned, and got the message loud and clear; the way he began to hump Bill being a rather clear indication.

Bill started out trying to be quiet, but Tom seemed to enjoy provoking him to make noise.

A little later on, the sun glinted into Bill's eyes as he lay tangled up with Tom in his snug bed, and the only thing stopping him from taking a well-deserved nap was the assertion of other bodily functions. Bill groaned as his stomach made an alarming gurgling noise.

"I guess it's time to get up," Bill said, pushing at Tom's chest.

"Whatever," Tom sighed, turning onto his side and wrapping Bill up in both arms. He snuggled his head down against Bill's shoulder. "Wait, I remembered something; I was going to ask earlier, but...you know. You've been saying all this time you were waiting for the One, to have sex...does that mean I'm the One?"

Bill replied with utmost seriousness, “You're the one I have now.”

“Dick.”

“I like _your_ dick.”

“Hmm, that's weird,” Tom said with a look of mock-surprise. He dropped a kiss to Bill's shoulder. “I like yours.”

“All this time...” Bill smacked at him ineffectually. “You have no idea how tortured I was, Tom! All this time, damn it Tom, when I thought you were straight...”

“Oh, I am straight!” Tom asserted with a completely earnest look.

“What are you, then?” Bill narrowed his eyes. “And don't give me a cop-out like 'Bill-sexual;' that's cheating, it's not a valid answer.”

Tom's left brow raised; he took a breath. “In love. Is that good enough?”

“Mmm.” Bill melted against his boyfriend's side, basking in the happy glow of affirmation. “I'll take it. How much is it worth; does it get me breakfast in bed?"

Tom laughed at him, caught a look at Bill's insulted face, and laughed harder. "Maybe on your birthday," he said with a smirk.

"Which isn't until next year," Bill said reproachfully, drawing his nails down Tom's bare chest and making him shiver.

"Or Valentine's Day," Tom said, his amused expression turning thoughtful. "I've never done anything for Valentine's Day before."

"And you won't this year, either, at this rate," Bill said wryly, and dissolved into a helpless grin when Tom gave him horrified puppy eyes.

"You wouldn't," he said.

"Live in fear," Bill teased him. He climbed over Tom, spanking at his bared bottom on the way out of bed, cackling when Tom yelped like a little kid.

"That's what you get for being so lazy on a beautiful Saturday morning," Bill told him, stepping into his boxers and hunting for his own shirt, making a face when he found it crumpled in a heap on the floor, still damp from the rain last night.

"Lazy!?" Tom protested, rolling around in bed until he faced Bill, still frog-bare. "Hey, I just gave you a good, hard--"

"Give me a t-shirt, now; I want coffee," Bill interrupted.

"Second drawer of the dresser," Tom told him. He sprawled out on his back and stretched. "I'll be along in a minute." He sounded as though he'd fall asleep, instead.

Bill retrieved a clean, double-x large shirt from the indicated drawer and held it up to his nose, inhaling the scent of detergent and dryer sheets, and the faint hint of coconut that seemed to imbue everything Tom wore because of his dread-wax. He grinned and pulled it over his head, twisting around to appraise the way it fell in voluminous folds around him.

"Sexy," Tom commented.

Bill made wide eyes at him. "No way."

"You're wearing my shirt after we made love in my bed," Tom told him, raising a brow. "It's definitely sexy."

Bill flushed. "I, I'm gonna go make coffee now," he squeaked, as his throat threatened to close up on him. Before he pulled the door shut behind him, he peered around it, sticking his head around the jamb, blurted, "Love you!" and hauled it closed, scurrying up the hall with his face reddening. Tom had definitely made love to him just now, so slow and tenderly that Bill had been scared he'd cry again, comparing it to the first time and how his feelings now were the inverse of what they'd been. He was completely convinced that he was the happiest person in the world this morning; he had everything he'd been so worried he was giving away without the same emotion returned.

Bill made use of the facilities, took a quick shower, and stole the use of Tom's toothbrush – which he identified by the helpful label Tom had fixed onto it with clear packing tape, along with the words 'Andi dont use.' He thought about going back to the bedroom and rousing Tom forcibly, decided that might portend a bad start to his commencement of boyfriend duties, and let the odor of brewing coffee lure him out into the apartment even though he knew that the probability of encountering Andreas would be pretty high.

As he shuffled his way closer to the kitchen, a board creaked beneath the carpet and Bill winced, then breezed onward. He had every right to hold his head up high, now.

"Damn it, Tom, it's one thing for you to be loud as fuck when I'm out all night, but since when do you nail them the next morning--" Andreas began, turning from the kitchen counter with a steaming mug of coffee in both hands. "B-Bill?"

"Morning," Bill said cheerfully. "Thank God _someone_ made coffee." He walked past a stunned Andreas and rummaged through the cabinets, searching for a mug that wasn't chipped or too battered.

"That's Tom's shirt," Andreas observed.

"Uh-huh," Bill confirmed, sidling over to the fridge and checking for half and half. Coming up zero on that score, he made do with two percent milk and found the sugar, giving himself a few heaping spoonfuls before turning his coffee blond.

"Why are you wearing Tom's shirt?" Andreas asked pathetically. He continued in a thin, high voice, "That was you again, this morning? God, Bill! I thought we talked about this! And you're letting him--"

Bill flashed him a secretive smile before burying the expression in his coffee mug. Devoting himself to that first hit of caffeine was a good preventive measure to saying something like, "Yeah, I'm letting Tom do _everything_ to me."

"Letting him what?" Tom's voice interrupted, and Tom himself strode into the kitchen, track pants hitched low over his hips, only far enough to cover the essentials. He scratched at one buttock as he pressed in close beside Bill, maybe unnecessarily close but pleasantly enough as he reached for his own mug. He gave Bill a sweet little smirk. "Morning again."

"Mm," Bill said, rubbing his foot against Tom's ankle because his hands were occupied.

"Letting him – with you!" Andreas said incoherently. "Tom, you and Ariel--"

Tom turned and snapped, "I told you already, that was nothing! You went on and on about it so I fucking begged you not to tell Bill, because it was _nothing_ ; then you went and told him anyhow--"

"—because you were dating her!" Andreas said, aghast.

Tom sighed noisily and poured himself a cup of coffee. "I took her out on dates; there's a distinction, you know. And I did it because she was blackmailing me." He sidled up to Bill with a low, 'hey,' and slid an arm around him as he turned to prop his butt against the counter.

Bill cupped both hands around his mug and leaned against Tom, making his affiliation clear.

"I thought you were joking about that," Andreas said, pulling a stupefied expression. "I mean, seriously? It sounded like a fucking joke – I mean, if a girl has to blackmail you to date her..."

"She did," Tom said. "And I wasn't."

Andreas gestured with his own mug, slopping liquid over the brim and ignoring the spill. "What's with you and Bill, then?" He was wild-eyed again.

"We're dating," Tom said firmly.

Bill plied his elbow against Tom's side. "You haven't taken me on a single date, yet," he objected.

Tom's eyes rounded. "You're right," he admitted. "Tonight?"

"I have homework..."

"Bill," Tom groaned. "You're my boyfriend now; you can't blow me off for homework."

"I didn't know that was a rule," Bill said with a snort. "Can you find that for me in the boyfriend handbook, Tom? Oh, wait; there isn't one."

"Bill," Tom wheedled. "For me?"

Bill sipped his coffee and raised a brow. "You can pick me up at eight," he decided. He snuggled in as Tom's arm tightened around him.

Andreas was gaping. "Oh, my God," he said, and couldn't seem to find anything else that fit, because he repeated it a little louder. "Oh, my God. You two really are...oh, my God."

"You didn't do us any favors, jackass," Tom told Andreas, his tone hard.

"Well, how was I supposed to know?" Andreas protested. "I've never seen you do anything more than hit it and quit it, so I was worried for Bill."

"Thanks," Bill said, and made a little face. "As it turns out, I can take care of myself." With a little help from Georg, he added in his thoughts, and there was something he didn't see the need to share with Tom, boyfriend status now or no.

"Right," Andreas said, and looked back and forth between them. "Well. Bill's got a single – can the two of you try to keep it over there?"

Tom snarled and advanced on him. "I'll show you where to keep it--"

Bill snickered and grabbed at Tom, sloshing coffee then giving up on helping Andreas anyhow, as their friend turned and fled.

As Tom and Andreas tore through the apartment, yelling and rough-housing, Bill stood riveted in the kitchen as a vital realization smacked him with the force of an anvil between the eyes. He had a date tonight.

"I have _nothing_ to wear!" Bill wailed.

~*~

The following week Bill entered the Lehardt Award competition, with Tom signed up as his guitar accompanist. 

Georg sat in the front row and grinned, with his quiet friend Gustav looking intent and even interested beside him. Andreas was in the crowd somewhere, making a face that alternated between cheesy encouragement and queasy horror, because he walked into the apartment at least every other day when Tom and Bill were enjoying quality time – the heating and insulation were better at Tom's. Bill's mom had driven down for the day, taking off work in order to see him perform. His girl friends from the dorms were lined up along one row, camera phones at the ready.

Bill sang his heart out, ignoring everything of stagecraft that told him to project to the audience. He sang to Tom, giving him the words that had sprung from what he'd thought to be a desperate, hopeless longing. He sang it now in the throes of love and was pretty sure he'd never sounded better.

Tom kept his gaze fixed on his guitar throughout most of the song. During Bill's last repeat of the chorus, he lifted his head at last and the sparkle in his eye, that adorable almost-shy smile of which only Bill got to see the other end, sent Bill clear into the stratosphere.

It kicked Bill into a higher gear, vocally, and he finished up the song with pride as he watched more than one audience member wipe furtively at their eyes.

~*~

"Oh, my God," Bill said aloud, fitting his hands together and rubbing them back and forth. He stared at the results board, fixed in place out of sheer disbelief. "Tom? Tom!!"

"What is it?" Tom called out, loping up the sidewalk and cutting across a wedge of grass to reach Bill's side faster. "Babe, did you win something?"

"Don't call me that," Bill protested, but snuggled back against the arm that Tom looped around his waist. "Look! Look at that!" He pointed at the board with a shaking finger. He couldn't say it. It didn't quite seem real.

"Judges' pick, Bill Trumper," Tom read aloud. "Bill, that's amazing!"

"I knew the odds of winning were slim; I mean, the _Lehardt Award,_ it's almost always the seniors that get it," Bill said, turning in Tom's arms to grab him in an enthusiastic embrace. "There's one winner, only one, with a runner-up if something, you know, happens."

"Plagiarism," Tom said knowledgeably. "Didn't that happen one year?"

"It's been years," Bill said, waving his hand. He squeezed his arms around Tom, tight, until his boyfriend oofed and complained he needed to breathe. "And there's only one judges' pick! Oh, my God. This is you; this is all you, you know."

"Don't be silly," Tom protested, swooping in to press a kiss to Bill's neck. "It's your song. It was all your hard work. All I did was play my guitar."

"Mmm, and you did it so well," Bill murmured, hugging him again.

An older person passed them on the sidewalk, then paused. "Bill Trumper? Congratulations," the woman said. She was one of the music department teachers, someone who worked with the instrument classes and so Bill hadn't had her for any classes.

"Thank you!" Bill exclaimed, grinning widely. He twisted around in Tom's arms to face the teacher, recognizing her now was one of the judges from the competition.

"And Tom Kaulitz?" she continued. "You accompanied Bill on guitar. Excellent fingering – I'm disappointed you're not in any of my classes."

"I'll work on that, ma'am," Tom said unexpectedly.

Bill swung his head over and eyed Tom with pleased bemusement. "Really?" he whispered, and Tom gave him an encouraging little smile.

"Your song was excellent," the teacher addressed Bill, giving him a smile and a nod. "Do submit next year, Bill – we were all very impressed. The love between you and your gentleman, here, was very touching as well – it's a precious thing, to love someone so much."

"Thank you," Bill said, thrilled to the core and grabbing at Tom's arm in an excess of excitement.

They said their goodbyes and Bill swiveled to face Tom, the grin taking up his entire being.

"Love you," Bill told him breathlessly.

Tom grinned back, lifting him into a hug so fierce Bill's feet left the ground, then he spun him. "Love you, too," Tom said into his ear, then set him down as they eyed each other with increasing absorption.

"I wish we could make the track team situation right for you," Bill fretted.

"Not after the way I quit," Tom said frankly. "Coach was pissed, Bill. It's okay. It's not as though I was in it for a scholarship, or anything – I was in it to run, and stay in shape, and I can still run, you know. And there's other ways to stay in shape." He reached in to get a deft pinch of Bill's ribs, his fingers dropping low at the last moment and going for the spot below Bill's hipbone.

"Tom! We're in public." Bill's capacity to blush was alive and well, and it seemed that Tom delighted in finding new and inventive ways to make him do so. "But you loved track. What Ariel did wasn't right, and your coach--"

"You win over the track team, okay?" Tom told him, raising a brow. "It's not even a competition. Besides, this way I can do my running in the morning, get it out of the way and spend my afternoons and evenings with you."

Bill arched a brow, letting Tom reel him in against his side as they made their way up the sidewalk. "I'm not going to argue with that," he said, pleased.

"Good," Tom said with satisfaction, threading his fingers through Bill's.

That had been another kind of revelation for Bill, as he went out with Tom in public. He'd expected Tom to be standoffish at best, skittish about even brushing up against him at worst, but Tom had been the first to reach for him. He wasn't obvious about it, but there had been no hesitation and that was what Bill needed.

"Oh," Bill said, tugging on Tom's hand. "What are your plans for winter break?"

Tom raised his brows. "I have a feeling you're about to tell me."

Bill grinned at him. "My mom's a bit psychic, you know. She told me if I was still dating you by Christmas, I was going to have to bring you home..."

"Better be careful," Tom said, giving him a grin in return. "Moms love me, Bill. It's the dads that want to shoot me on sight."

Bill snorted. "I'll remember to tell Mom to hide the shotgun. Come on, let's go home. I think I need a little reminder that looking at my face turns you on."

Tom gave him an interested smirk. "Let's hurry up, then, and I'll give you a _big_ reminder."

Bill grinned, swatted at him playfully, and they made a dash for the Blue bus line that would get them home.


End file.
